DE   WITT    '    BOOKSELLER 


f/i 


LITERARY    HAUNTS 
AND   HOMES 


BY  DR.  THEODORE  F.  WOLFE 
LITERARY  SHRINES 

THE     HAUNTS     OF     SOME     FAMOUS     AMERICAN 
AUTHORS 

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A   LITERARY   PILGRIMAGE 

AMONG  THE  HAUNTS  OF  SOME  FAMOUS  BRITISH 
AUTHORS 

Illustrated.  I2mo.  Crushed  buckram, 
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LITERARY   HAUNTS    AND    HOMES 

AMERICAN    AUTHORS 

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EDITION  DE  LUXE 
LITERARY  SHRINES  AND  A  LITERARY 

PILGRIMAGE 

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many  extra  illustrations  for  this  edition  only. 
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LITERARY 
HAUNTS 
H  O  M  S 


A  M  E  R  I  G;4j 
AUTHORS 


BY   THEODORE    F.  WOLFE 
M.D.  PH.D. 

AUTHOR    OF    A     LITERARY     PILGRIMAGE 
LITERARY    SHRINES    ETC. 


J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 
PHILADELPHIA  MDCCCXCIX 


COPYRIGHT,  1898 

BY 
THEODORE  F.  WOLFE 


PREFACE 


'TpHE  kindness  which  has  been  accorded  to 
•*•  the  previous  books  of  this  series — a  kind 
ness  so  generous  that  it  has  already  called  for  ten 
editions  besides  an  Edition  de  Luxe — encourages 
the  author  to  hope  that  the  present  volume  may 
receive  a  measure  of  the  same  favor. 

The  initial  volume,  "A  Literary  Pilgrimage,'' 
treats  mainly  of  the  places  associated  with  the 
lives  and  works  of  British  authors  from  the  time 
of  Chaucer  to  the  present ;  "  Literary  Shrines'* 
deals  with  the  scenes  of  American  writers,  in 
cluding  Hawthorne,  Emerson,  Alcott,  Thoreau, 
Longfellow,  Lowell,  Whittier,  Howells,  Holmes, 
Parkman,  Fuller,  and  others  ;  in  this  new  volume 
are  mentioned  the  homes  and  haunts  of  many  of 
the  more  recent  prominent  figures  in  literature, 
such  as  Kipling,  Mark  Twain,  Warner,  Howells, 
as  well  as  the  scenes  of  some  of  the  most  in 
teresting  of  our  standard  American  writers, — that 
genius,  Edgar  Allan  Poe,  Bryant,  Cooper,  Ir 
ving,  Stowe,  Whitman,  and  others  not  treated 
of  in  the  previous  work. 

Concerning  the   literary   landmarks  of    New 

York   City,  an   opulence  of  material,   collected 

during  several  years  of  exploration  and  research, 

has    been    condensed    in    the   chapters    entitled 

3 


Preface 

"  Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan,"  and,  despite 
omissions  necessitated  by  lack  of  space,  these 
chapters  will  be  found  to  contain  references  to 
scores  of  American  writers,  from  the  pioneers 
of  our  literature  to  those  favorites  of  our  house 
holds  to-day,  who,  for  a  greater  or  lesser  period, 
have  made  the  metropolis  their  home. 

As  in  the  case  of  the  other  books,  the  materials 
for  this  one  have  been  derived  from  prolonged 
or  repeated  sojourns  in  the  localities  described 
and  from  personal  intercourse  and  correspond 
ence  with  the  authors  mentioned  or  with  their 
surviving  friends  and  neighbors. 

Most  of  the  illustrations  are  reproduced  from 
new  and  heretofore  unpublished  photographs ; 
the  view  of  the  Poe  cottage,  made  just  prior  to 
its  removal,  is  here  used  by  the  kind  permission 
of  Messrs.  Harper  &  Brothers. 


CONTENTS 


LITERARY  HAUNTS  OF  MANHATTAN 

PAGE 

I.  IN  OLDEST  NEW  YORK. 

Scenes  and  Associations— Irving— Paulding— Payne-Her 
bert  —  Hamilton— Burr— Halleck— Hoffman— Authors 
Guild- Charlotte  Temple-Stedman-Stoddard- Wood 
ward— Morris  —  Poe—  Brockden  Broivn  —  Bryant- 
Cable  -  Thorburn  -  Mrs.  Renivick-Hone-Willis- 
Ray  Palmer 13 

II.   ABOUT  AND  ABOVE  CITY  HALL  PARK. 

Clarke— Bryant—  Poe— Irving—  Greeley—  Cozzens—  Curtis  — 
Payne  -  Old-time  Resorts  -  Drake-Dana-Halleck- 
Cooper— Bayard  Taylor— Hoffman- Stoddard-  Wood- 
ivorth—  Hotvells^s  Scenes -Mrs,  Lathrop— Scott's 
"  Rebecca" -Aldrich  -  Pfaff*  s-Burr-Paine-Bret 
Harte-Many  Others 35 

III.  THE  LATIN  QUARTER  AND  ITS  ENVIRONS. 

Hoivells  -  James  -  Bayard  Taylor-Lathrop-De  Kay- 
Poe-Gildcr— Bryant— Mrs.  Wiggin-Mrs.  Osgood— 
Stoddard  —  Godiuin  —  Greeley  —  Cooper  —  Whitman— 
White-Stedman-Patti-Lotos  Club— Century— Bun- 
ner—Mattheius-Du  Chaillu— Alice  Cary-Griswold- 
Mrs.  Burton  Harrison— Irving,  etc 57 

5 


Contents 

PAGB 

IV.  NORTHWARD  TO  THE  HARLEM,  AND  BEYOND. 

Gris-wold-Eggleston-De  Kay-Authors  Club-Fawcett- 
Mitchell-Hutton-Century  Club-Lotos-Mrs.  Wil- 
cox—Stedman-  Wiggin—Hoiuelh—  Poe—Mahan—Au- 
dubon-Mrs.  Barr-Brooks-Melville-Davis-Allen- 
Hopkinson  Smith  -  Holland '-  Van  Dyke-Wilson- 
Margaret  Fuller— Irving— Drake's  Grave ,  etc.  .  .  80 

HOMES  AND  HAUNTS  OF   POE 

Fordham  Cottage-The  Rooms-Neighbors-Reminiscences- 
Sepulchre  of  "  Annabel  Lee"-Poe  Park-Philadel 
phia  Shrines— Richmond  Haunts  and  Scenes— House 
and  Grave  of  "  Helen'" -Other  Richmond  Friends- 
Baltimore  Homes-11  Mary" -Where  Poe  died- 
Tomb 104 

BRYANT,  WHITMAN,  ETC. :    A  LONG 
ISLAND    RAMBLE 

Brooklyn  Shrines— Greenwood  Literary  Graves— Whit 
man  at  Whitcstone-Bryanfs  Cedarmere-Roslyn- 
Bryanf  s  Tomb— Birthplace  of  Whitman— Whitman 
and  Hunting  ton— The  Oldest  Living  Poet— Julian 
Hawthorne  —  Scenes  of  "Home,  Siveet  Home''''— 
Where  Margaret  Fuller  perished 129 

COOPER    SHRINES   AND    SCENES 

In   Neiv   fork  City- New  Rochelle-Paine* s   Home  and 

Monument-Heathcote  Hill-"  Closet  Hall"-Ange- 

vine-Where    Cooper  first  tvrote-Scenes  of  "  The 

Spy^-Jay^s  Bedford  House- Otsego-Cooper* s  Home 

6 


Contents 

PAGB 

and    Grave-Recollections-Scenes,     Incidents,     and 
Characters  of « «  The  Deer  slayer," '  « '  Pioneers ,' '  «/c.     1 54 

IRVING'S   SUNNYSIDE   AND   SLEEPY 
HOLLOW 

Sunny  side-Description-Environment-Irving' s  Study  and 
Rooms-History-Associations  ivith  Irving  s  Works 
-  Eminent  Visitors  -  Tarry  town  -  Memorials  and 
Shrines-Sleepy  Hollow-Scenes  of  Legend-"  Brom 
Bones"  -  Ancient  Dutch  Church  and  Cemetery- 
Grave  of  Irving *74 

KIPLING,  HARTFORD  AUTHORS 
ETC.:  A  CONNECTICUT  RIVER 
PILGRIMAGE 

The  Hartford  Wits-Hartford  Literary  Shrines- W 'hi 't- 
tier-Mrs.  Sigourney-Mrs.  Slosson-Mark  Twain- 
Charles  Dudley  Warner-Mrs.  Stoive-Bancroft- 
Holland-Bellamy- Northampton  -  Cable  -  Brattle- 
boro-Miss  Wilkins,  etc.-Kipling  Abodes  and  En 
virons-Recollections  of  Kipling -His  Character, 
Work,  and  Recreations  -  Eugene  Field  .  .  .  .  193 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

Rudyard   Kipling's  American  Home,  near  Brattle- 

boro,  Vermont Frontispiece. 

The  Poe  Cottage  at  Fordham 105 

Bryant's  Cedarmere 13? 

Birthplace  of  Walt  Whitman 144 


LITERARY  HAUNTS  OF 
MANHATTAN 


I.  In  Oldest  New  York 
II.  About  and  Above  City  Hall 
Park 

III.  The    Latin    Quarter    and    its 

Environs 

IV.  Northward  to  the  Harlem,  and 

Beyond 


I 
IN  OLDEST  NEW   YORK 


Scenes  and  Associations—  Irving— Paulding  —  Payne  —  Herbert- 
Hamilton  —  Burr  —  Halleck  —  Hoffman  —  Authors'  Guild- 
Charlotte  Temple-Stedman—Stoddard-  Woodward— Mor 
ris  —  Poe—  Brockden  Brown  — Bryant— Cable—  Thorburn  — 
Mrs.  Renivick-Hone-Willis-Ray  Palmer. 

TVyTATERIAL  New  York  is  both  large  and 
*•**'  great ;  its  dimensions  are  vast,  its  wealth 
is  enormous,  its  commercial  power  is  immeas 
urable,  its  better  streets  and  structures  are  grand 
and  imposing,  the  richest  realties  upon  the 
planet  lie  within  its  limits.  But,  for  those  who 
can  discern  it,  there  is  a  greater  New  York, 
replete  with  glorious  memories  and  big  with 
thoughtful  suggestions,  which  dwarfs  and  subor 
dinates  the  material  vastness  and  opulence, — a 
city  redolent  of  letters,  of  history,  of  romance, 
of  poetry.  Some  subtle  sense  may  enable  us  to 
see,  beneath  the  mammoth  edifices,  the  modest 
homes  of  the  pioneers  of  cisatlantic  literature, 
within  the  twilight  of  canon  like  passages  roofed 
by  railways  and  dominated  by  multi-storied 
structures,  the  quiet  streets  where  walked  gen 
erations  of  thinkers ;  to  hear  upon  the  pave, 
amid  the  clamor  of  the  modern  Babel,  the  re- 
13 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

echoing  footfalls  of  men  whose  memory  the 
world  will  not  let  die.  In  the  older  section  of 
the  city  every  rod  pressed  by  our  pilgrim  feet 
becomes  sacred  ground  when  we  heed  its  sug 
gestions  of  the  past,  its  association  with  the 
lives  and  works  of  the  luminaries  who  here 
created  for  the  young  republic  a  place  and  a 
name  in  the  world  of  letters  ;  memories  of  the 
"  Dutch  Herodotus,"  Knickerbocker,  pervade 
the  ancient  thoroughfares  ;  Halleck  and  Wood- 
worth  hallow  Wall  Street ;  Broadway  is  sung  by 
Willis  and  Drake  ;  the  shade  of  Clarke  stalks  in 
City  Hall  Park. 

To  this  memory-haunted  city  came  Bryant 
from  his  Berkshire  home  ;  here  Cooper  and 
Brockden  Brown  wrote,  Talleyrand  taught, 
Whitefield,  Edwards,  and  Tennent  preached, 
Francis  and  Emmet  practised.  Here  Irving  was 
born,  Paulding  flourished,  Drake  died,  Hamilton 
was  buried.  These  hallowing  memories  are 
reminiscent  of  a  time  long  past,  when  the  city 
held  a  virtual  monopoly  of  the  best  and  fore 
most  of  distinctively  American  literature ;  but 
the  modern  New  York  has  not  been  content 
with  mere  material  greatness  and  commercial 
power  ;  its  wealth  has  founded  great  libraries, 
its  commercial  spirit  has  erected  large  publish 
ing-houses  and  established  great  journals  and 


Lettered  Associations 

greater  magazines,  giving  generous  rewards  to 
numerous  authors  and  writers ;  these  in  turn 
have  organized  the  various  clubs  and  associa 
tions  of  literary  men  which  have  helped  to  pro 
mote  and  popularize  lettered  tastes,  and  to  create 
an  atmosphere  which  stimulates  literary  talent 
and  attracts  its  possessors  from  other  portions  of 
the  republic.  So  that  the  New  York  of  our 
day,  with  its  dependencies,  holds  a  galaxy  of  lit 
erary  lights  nowhere  excelled  upon  our  conti 
nent,  and  as  we  proceed  northward  from  the 
fast  disappearing  literary  shrines  of  the  older 
Manhattan  we  find  in  increasing  proportion  the 
haunts  of  more  recent  writers,  some  .of  whom 
yet  dwell  among  us  and  maintain  here  a  litera 
ture  of  broader  scope  than  America  has  before 
known. 

To  seek  out  some  of  the  scenes  of  Manhat 
tan's  litterateurs  has  been  our  object  during 
weeks  of  "  splendid  strolling,"  which  have  re 
vealed  shrines  so  numerous  that  many  of  them 
may  not  be  even  mentioned  here. 

If  our  quest  begin  where  New  York  began, 
at  the  Battery,  we  find  ourselves  at  the  outset  in 
a  region  rife  with  the  memories  we  esteem  most 
precious.  All  about  us  lie  scenes  that  are  sug 
gestive  of  Irving  and  his  whimsical  conceits  : 
here  is  the  spot  where  Oloffe  Van  Kortlandt  of 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Knickerbocker's  history  was  cast  upon  Manhat 
tan's  shores  and  saw  the  vision  of  St.  Nicholas 
which  encouraged  the  Dutchmen  to  settle  there  ; 
here  is  the  site  of  mighty  Fort  Amsterdam,  upon 
whose  ramparts  "  William  the  Testy"  erected 
his  windmills  and  Quaker  cannon,  the  place  of 
the  outlying  bulwarks  of  mud  "  faced  with  clam 
shells,"  which  later  became  the  scene  of  extra- 
foraneous  festivals  and  dances,  and  where  the 
puissant  Peter  Stuyvesant  witnessed  that  "  ex 
hibition  of  the  graces"  which  evoked  his  decree 
that  all  petticoats  should  be  flounced  at  the  bot 
tom.  Still  later  Irving  himself  frequented  the 
then  fashionable  resort,  and  walked  with  such 
companions  as  Paulding  and  Verplanck,  or  pon 
dered  his  compositions  beneath  the  sycamores 
by  the  water-side  ;  here  Halleck,  Drake,  Willis, 
and  Morris  were  habitual  strollers  in  bygone 
days ;  here  Bayard  Taylor,  listening  to  the  lap 
ping  of  the  waters  upon  the  shore,  composed 
••  The  Waves,"  and  the  charm  of  the  place  in 
spired  some  of  the  graceful  stanzas  of  Thomas 
Appleton.  Stedman,  too,  has  sung  of  the  Bat 
tery  in  a  popular  poem,  and  Robert  Burns  Wil 
son,  in  his  ••  Eventide,"  has  embalmed  an  en 
chanting  memory  of  that  verdant  and  breezy 
headland.  Hither  Howells  brings  Basil  and 
Isabel  March  in  the  outset  of"  Their  Wedding 
16 


The  Battery 

Journey,"  and  hither  they  return  in  "  A  Hazard 
of  New  Fortunes." 

Despite  the  encroachments  of  the  elevated 
railways,  this  is  still  one  of  the  most  delightful 
of  Manhattan's  pleasure-grounds:  as  we  pace 
its  margin  of  sea-wall  we  look  out  upon  the 
most  beautiful  of  bays,  flecked  with  flashing 
craft,  and  see  beyond  its  shimmering  waters 
scenes  of  song  and  story.  Here  we  behold  the 
theatre  of  some  of  the  exploits  of  Cooper's 
•«  Water-Witch  ;"  there  is  the  islet — where  now 
the  great  bronze  goddess  lifts  her  electric  torch 
— which  the  erudite  Knickerbocker  would  have 
us  believe  was  once  "  a  wart  on  Anthony's 
Nose  ;"  beyond  are  the  verdant  upland  slopes 
where  William  Winter  lives  and  George  Wil 
liam  Curtis  died ;  yonder  lie  the  shores  of 
ancient  Pavonia,  palled  by  humid  outpourings 
of  factories  and  refineries,  as  they  were  afore 
time  by  clouds  from  the  pipes  of  the  burghers 
of  Communipaw. 

In  the  near-by  straggling  streets — believed  to 
have  been  laid  out  by  the  cows — have  lived 
many  men  of  letters  in  picturesque  dwellings 
which,  after  lapsing  through  various  stages  of 
domiciliary  dishonor,  have  usually  given  place  to 
business  structures.  At  No.  17  State  Street, 
opposite  the  Battery,  whilom  was  the  home  of 

2  17 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Irving's  older  brother  William,  the  Pindar 
Cockloft  of  "  Salmagundi ;"  with  him  dwelt  his 
brother-in-law,  James  K.  Paulding,  who  contrib 
uted  most  of  "  Whim-Whams  and  Opinions  of 
Launcelot  Langstaff"  to  that  sprightly  literary 
production,  and  who  here  wrote  "  The  Back 
woodsman,"  his  most  finished  poem.  William 
Irving's  house  was  the  resort  of  a  brilliant 
coterie  of  the  wits  of  the  town,  including  that 
roistering  company  composed  of  Irving,  Kem- 
ble,  Paulding,  etc.,  and  variously  known  as 
"  The  Nine  Worthies,"  "  Lads  of  Kilkenny," 
and  "  The  Ancients,"  who  held  carousal  at 
Cockloft  Hall.  It  is  noteworthy  that  the  an 
cient  Hall  itself  yet  stands  upon  the  bank  of  the 
Passaic.  Of  this  circle,  Gouverneur  Kemble, 
"  The  Patroon"  of  Cockloft,  lived  a  few  rods 
distant  from  William  Irving's,  in  a  staid  and 
stately  mansion  standing  amid  ample  gardens  in 
Whitehall,  at  the  corner  of  Stone  Street.  This 
was  also  a  haunt  of  Irving,  and  years  afterwards 
we  find  Paulding,  who  had  married  Kemble's 
sister,  writing  to  Irving  in  Europe,  "  In  the 
division  of  the  estate  the  old  home  has  fallen  to 
me ;  here  have  I  set  up  my  tent,  and  if  living  in 
a  great  house  constitutes  a  great  man,  a  great 
man  am  I,  at  your  service."  Paulding,  who 
was  celebrated  in  Halleck's  "  Fanny,"  and  hu- 
18 


Homes  of  Irving  and  Friends — Payne 

morously  greeted  by  Drake  as  "  the  poet  of  the 
backwoods,  cabbages,  log-huts,  and  gin,"  wrote 
here  many  poems, — like  "  The  Old  Man's  Ca 
rousal," — sketches,  and  tales :  of  the  latter, 
"  The  Dutchman's  Fireside"  was  most  success 
ful  ;  of  his  many  verses,  the  only  lines  now 
often  recalled  are  those  beginning  "  Peter  Piper 
picked  a  peck  of  pickled  peppers."  Paulding 
left  the  old  house  to  take  a  place  in  Van  Buren's 
cabinet,  and  its  site  is  now  covered  by  a  large 
office  building. 

At  No.  3  Bridge  Street,  just  around  the  corner 
from  Paulding's,  Irving  lived  some  years  after 
his  first  residence  abroad,  in  the  home  of  his 
brother  Eben,  the  "  Captain  Great-Heart"  of 
the  Cockloft  frolics.  Irving  called  this  house 
"  the  family  hive,"  because  it  was  always  filled 
with  relatives :  it  was  here  that  his  brother 
Peter,  another  of  "  The  Nine  Worthies"  and 
founder  of  The  Morning  Cbroniclet  died.  A  few 
steps  out  of  Whitehall  in  Pearl  Street,  in  what 
was  then  No.  33,  a  dwelling  of  somewhat  de 
cayed  gentility,  John  Howard  Payne,  author  of 
the  immortal  lyric  "  Home,  Sweet  Home,"  first 
saw  the  light ;  and  in  this  same  street,  where 
the  father  of  Halleck's  "  Fanny"  dwelt  after  his 
retirement  from  trade,  we  find,  beyond  the 
historic  Fraunces's  Tavern,  the  place  where 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Irving  and  his  brother  commerced  as  "  P.  &  E. 
Irving  £  Co.,  Merchants.*'  Near  Whitehall, 
too,  we  find  in  Beaver  Street  the  site  of  the 
school  in  which  poor  Henry  William  Herbert 
taught  Greek  during  eight  years  of  the  period 
in  which  his  best  historical  romances  were 
produced.  The  school  has  given  place  to  a 
modern  warehouse,  but  upon  the  opposite  side 
of  Broadway  still  stands  the  Stevens  House, 
where,  in  his  room  upon  the  second  floor,  he 
ended  his  unhappy  life  with  a  pistol-shot,  years 
after  he  had  made  himself  known  in  another 
department  of  literature  under  the  pen  name  of 
Frank  Forrester. 

Other  portions  of  Broadway  have  been  sung 
in  Willis's  "  Unseen  Spirits"  and  Clarke's 
"  Belles  of  Broadway,"  and  by  the  muses  of 
William  Allen  Butler  and  Richard  Watson 
Gilder  ;  and  this  lower  portion — to  which  our 
ramble  has  brought  us — figures  in  the  verse  of 
Drake  and  Halleck,  who  as  "  Croaker  &  Co." 
provoked  the  talk  of  the  town  by  their  quaint 
and  satirical  poems  in  the  Evening  Post  in  the 
days  when  Lower  Broadway  was  still  the 
fashionable  promenade.  For  years  after  Halleck 
found  "  Our  fourteen  wards  Contain  some  thirty- 
seven  bards,"  one  of  the  bards,  his  friend  the 
"  Mad  Poet"  McDonald  Clarke,  who  made 

20 


Lower  Broadway — Bowling  Green 

Broadway  his  habitual  haunt  and  found  in  it  the 
inspiration  of  much  of  his  erratic  song,  was 
prominent  among  the  promenaders  here  by 
reason  of  his  military  bearing  and  garb.  In  a 
modest  domicile  of  red  brick  which  stood  near 
the  beginning  of  Broadway  and  has  long  been 
supplanted  by  a  tall  business  building,  Irving 
lived  for  some  years  with  Henry  Brevoort ;  here 
in  his  second-story  library,  whose  windows 
looked  out  upon  Bowling  Green,  where  his 
doughty  hero  assembled  his  warriors  for  the 
campaign  against  the  Swedes,  and  upon  the  site 
of  Fort  Amsterdam,  the  scene  of  so  many  inci 
dents  of  the  book,  he  prepared  a  revision  of  the 
first  American  work  which  all  the  world  read, 
"  Knickerbocker's  History.'*  Edgar  Fawcett 
has  lately  laid  a  scene  of  his  "  Romance  of  Old 
New  York"  at  this  historic  little  Green ;  a  few 
doors  above  it  an  architectural  colossus  covers 
the  spot  where  Alexander  Hamilton,  principal 
writer  of  "  The  Federalist,"  once  resided,  and 
just  around  the  corner,  in  what  is  now  Exchange 
Place,  a  region  of  banking  buildings,  he  had  his 
office  at  the  time  of  the  fateful  duel  with  Burr. 
In  a  narrow  apartment  of  the  upper  floor  of 
the  lofty  office  building  at  the  corner  of  Ex 
change  Place  and  Hanover  Street  the  versatile 
author  of  "  Tom  Crogan"  and  other  popular 

21 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

books  does  business  as  "  Francis  H.  Smith, 
Constructing  Engineer  and  Contractor." 

An  edifice  of  painted  brick  at  the  corner  of 
Greenwich  and  Rector  Streets,  west  of  Broad 
way,  was  the  boarding-house  of  Irving  at  the 
time  Halleck  lodged  but  a  few  doors  distant  in 
Greenwich  Street,  in  rooms  which  he  described 
to  his  sister  as  "  neat  and  indeed  elegant." 
While  living  here  he  formed  the  familiar  friend 
ship  with  the  poet  of  "The  Culprit  Fay"  which 
was  to  be  too  soon  ended  by  the  death  of  Drake, 
and  here  Halleck  wrote  the  poem  "  On  the 
Prospect  of  War,"  commencing,  "  When  the 
bright  star  of  hope  for  our  country  was  clouded." 
Near  by  in  the  same  street,  a  three-storied  brick 
house  with  green  Venetian  blinds  was  once  the 
home  of  Hoffman,  living's  legal  preceptor, 
where  was  born  the  brilliant  and  unfortunate 
Charles  Fenno  Hoffman,  half-brother  to  Irving's 
fiancee. 

The  American  Authors'  Guild,  of  which 
General  Wilson  is  the  presiding  and  animating 
spirit,  and  whose  chief  aim  is  to  aid  and  advise 
young  authors,  has  its  present  quarters  in  the 
new  Empire  building  which  towers  above 
Rector  Street. 

The  stroll  along  Broadway  has  brought  us  to 
Trinity  Churchyard,  with  its  many  ancient 
22 


Halleck— Authors'  Guild— Temple 

monuments,  no  one  of  which,  albeit  graven  with 
the  name  of  statesman  or  warrior,  so  much  stirs 
the  interest  of  the  passing  throng  as  the  poor, 
despoiled  gravestone,  sunk  in  the  sward  a  few 
feet  from  the  sidewalk,  which  tells  that  "  Char 
lotte  Temple,"  the  unhappy  heroine  of  Mrs. 
Rowson's  pathetic  tale,  has  here  found  rest  on  the 
lap  of  earth.  At  a  book-store  a  block  above,  on 
the  6th  of  December,  1809,  the  issuance  of  "  a 
History  of  New  York"  was  announced,  the  same 
being  "  published  to  discharge  certain  debts  Mr. 
Diedrich  Knickerbocker  has  left  behind  him." 

The  spire  of  old  Trinity  overlooks  the  length 
of  the  sordid  money  centre  which  has  been 
celebrated  in  the  poetic  humor  and  sentiment  of 
"  Fanny,"  «  Pan  in  Wall  Street,"  and  "  Israel 
Freyer's  Bid  for  Gold,"  and  hallowed  by  the 
commercial  labors  of  the  bards  Halleck,  Stedman, 
Stoddard,  and  others.  At  No.  3  Wall,  then  the 
corner  of  New  Street,  Irving  displayed  his  law- 
sign  on  the  house  of  his  brother  John,  and  there 
shared  his  office  while  projecting,  with  William 
Irving  and  his  brother-in-law  Paulding,  the  pub 
lication  of  the  droll  and  sparkling  "  Salmagundi" 
papers,  which  were  to  "  vex  and  charm  the 
town."  Upon  the  opposite  corner,  covered 
now  by  lofty  office  buildings,  was  the  store  of 
Wiley  the  publisher,  whose  back  room — called 
-3 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

"  The  Den"  by  Cooper  the  novelist,  who  held 
a  sort  of  literary  court  there — was  the  familiar 
lounge  for  many  of  the  American  literary  men  of 
the  time,  including  Halleck,  Dunlap,  Percival, 
Paulding,  etc.,  much  as  Murray's  London  draw 
ing-room  was  for  English  authors.  It  was  from 
this  establishment  that  Richard  Henry  Dana — 
to  whom  the  manuscript  of  "  Thanatopsis"  was 
submitted  before  publication,  and  who  was  one 
of  the  first  to  recognize  the  genius  of  Bryant — 
issued  "  The  Idle  Man,"  in  which  Bryant's 
"  Green  River"  first  appeared,  and  to  which 
Allston  was  a  contributor. 

Among  the  old  offices  on  the  site  of  the 
United  Bank  Building  was"  Ugly  Hall,"  where 
were  held  the  seances  of  the  "Ugly  Club,"  a 
circle  of  handsome  young  men,  among  whom 
Halleck  was  a  leading  spirit.  Nearer  Broad 
Street  was  the  law-office  of  Irving's  nephew  and 
biographer  Pierre  M.  Irving,  and,  near  by,  the 
prim  old  mansion  in  which  the  scholarly  writer 
Gulian  C.  Verplanck,  co-author  of  "  The 
Talisman,"  was  born.  A  tall  building  a  few 
doors  out  of  Wall  in  Broad  Street  holds  the 
offices  where  our  poet  and  critic  Edmund  C. 
Stedman  is  a  banker  for  some  hours  of  each  day. 
Hamilton  erst  had  his  modest  home  almost 
opposite  to  where  now 

24 


Authors  in  Wall  Street 

"  the  Treasury's  marble  front 
Looks  over  Wall  Street's  mingled  nations," 

and  but  a  stone's  throw  from  that  of  his  rival 
Burr  in  Nassau  Street.  A  few  steps  distant  were 
the  law-offices  of  Hoffman,  where  Irving  was  a 
student,  and  where,  as  his  letters  tell  us,  crazy 
furniture  and  dirty  windows  contributed  to  the 
general  gloom,  while  "  the  ponderous  fathers 
of  the  law  frowned  upon  us  from  their  shelves 
in  the  awful  majesty  of  folio  grandeur."  The 
Dutchess  County  Insurance  Company,  of  which 
Halleck  was  secretary,  was  located  around  the 
next  corner  in  William  Street ;  not  far  away  in 
the  same  thoroughfare  was  the  Evening  Post  in 
the  days  when  Bryant  came  to  its  editorship  ; 
and  the  law-office  of  Burr  was  once  upon  the 
same  block.  In  the  Custom  House  we  may  still 
find,  in  what  was  then  the  Debenture  Room, 
the  place  where  our  bard  Richard  Henry  Stod- 
dard — like  Lamb  in  the  East  India  House — 
wrought  upon  uncongenial  tasks  during  the  years 
in  which  he  gave  forth  such  poems  as  "  Songs 
of  Summer,"  "  The  King's  Bell,"  and  the  pa 
thetic  stanzas  of  "  In  Memoriam."  Near  the 
foot  of  Wall  Street,  Samuel  Woodworth,  author 
of  "  The  Old  Oaken  Bucket,"  had  his  printing- 
office  ;  here  he  published  some  of  the  several 
literary  periodicals  he  vainly  endeavored  to  float, 
25 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

and  produced  many  poems  over  the  nom  de  plume 
of  "  Selim,"  a  name  by  which  he  was  called  by 
his  intimates.  In  the  same  neighborhood  Jona 
than  Edwards,  author  of  "  The  Will"  and  other 
learned  treatises,  first  preached  to  a  congrega 
tion  of  seceders  from  a  church  farther  up  Wall 
Street. 

Upon  the  site  of  the  Gillender  Building  in 
Nassau  Street  the  genial  "  Harry  Franco" 
(Charles  F.  Briggs)  and  the  scintillant  Edgar 
Allan  Poe  edited  the  Broadway  Journal,  which 
Poe  removed  to  Clinton  Hall  after  he  had  pur 
chased  his  partner's  interest  with  a  note  which 
Horace  Greeley  subsequently  had  to  pay.  At 
No.  9  of  the  same  block,  covered  now  by  a 
great  bank  edifice,  the  poets  Woodworth  and 
Morris  sometime  published  the  New  York 
Mirror  and  Ladies*  Gazette,  in  the  same  build 
ing  where  Pierre  M.  Irving  for  twelve  years  had 
his  office.  The  home  of  Dr.  Elihu  Hubbard 
Smith,  an  old-fashioned  house  in  the  contiguous 
Pine  Street  nearer  to  William,  was  the  abode  of 
Charles  Brockden  Brown,  the  first  American  to 
adopt  literature  as  a  sole  profession.  He  had 
become  the  attached  friend  of  Smith  while  the 
latter  was  studying  medicine  in  Philadelphia, 
and  afterward,  when  Brown's  friends  there  dis 
couraged  his  literary  ambition  and  projects,  he 
26 


Poe — Brockden  Brown — Irving 

removed  to  New  York  and  became  an  inmate 
of  Smith's  house,  where  he  wrote  "  Wieland," 
"  Ormond,"  "  Arthur  Mervyn,"  and  other 
weird  and  once  widely  read  tales,  said  to  have 
greatly  interested  Shelley  and  to  have  suggested 
some  of  his  poems.  This  home  of  Smith's  re 
ceived  guests  like  "  the  American  Addison," — 
Joseph  Dennie,  author  of"  The  Lay  Preacher," 
— William  Dunlap,  and  James  Kent,  and  was  a 
meeting-place  of  the  "  Friendly  Club"  of  men 
of  letters  and  culture.  Here  Scandella,  an 
Italian  author,  was  tended  in  an  attack  of  yellow 
fever  by  his  friends  Smith  and  Brown,  who  took 
the  malady  from  him,  and,  of  the  trio,  Brown 
alone  survived. 

At  the  Pine  Street  corner  of  Broadway  a 
many-storied  modern  structure  has  replaced  the 
building  where  Bryant  edited  the  New  York 
Review  and  Atbenesum  Magazine,  in  which 
Halleck's  "  Burns"  and  "  Marco  Bozzaris"  first 
appeared.  Upon  the  opposite  side  of  Broadway 
the  Boreel  Building  covers  the  site  of  the  City 
Hotel,  the  old-time  resort  of  Cooper,  Hillhouse, 
Woodworth,  and  other  writers,  where  Louis 
Napoleon  dined  Halleck,  and  where  was  given 
the  dinner  to  Dickens  at  which  Irving  presided 
and  presented  the  guest  in  the  very  shortest  and 
most  abruptly  closed  of  dinner  speeches,  termi- 
27 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

nating  with   the  aside,  "  There,  I   told   you  I 
should  break  down,  and  I've  done  it !" 

A  humbler  resort,  whose  character  remains 
little  changed  although  the  building  has  been  re 
constructed,  was  the  quiet  little  ale-house  back 
of  the  hotel  at  the  corner  of  Thames  and  Tem 
ple  Streets,  kept  by  William  Reynolds,  an  ex- 
gravedigger  of  Trinity  Churchyard  and  a  lowly 
but  attached  friend  of  Halleck.  The  old  two- 
storied  frame  edifice  which  that  poet  knew 
here  had  been  one  of  the  reputed  residences  of 
"  Charlotte  Temple'."  Halleck  was  introduced 
to  the  place  by  Drake,  and  here  met  Irving, 
Clark,  and  other  literators.  Here,  too,  he 
made  the  acquaintance  of  "  Reynolds's  pretty 
daughter"  Eliza,  with  whom  he  maintained  a 
warm  friendship  to  the  day  of  his  death.  A 
few  rods  nearer  the  Hudson,  in  Greenwich 
Street,  a  dingy  edifice,  whose  entrance  has  been 
despoiled  of  its  brown  pillars,  and  whose  rooms 
are  darkened  by  the  elevated  railway  and  dinned 
and  assoiled  by  passing  trains,  was  the  abode  of 
Poe  during  a  brief  period  of  his  meteoric  course. 
It  was  to  this  house  that  he  came  with  a  cash 
capital  of  four  dollars  to  begin  anew  his  literary 
career  in  New  York,  and  here  he  prepared  for 
the  press  "  The  Balloon  Hoax,"  and  wrote 
"  The  Oblong  Box"  and  the  strange  ooem  of 
28 


A  Haunt  of  Literators — Poe 

"Dreamland."  In  the  next,  Cedar,  street 
lived  for  a  time  the  brother  of  Thomas  Camp 
bell,  to  whom  the  bard  consigned  the  manu 
script  of"  O'Connor's  Child"  and  a  new  edition 
of"  Gertrude  of  Wyoming,"  for  the  publication 
of  which  in  America  Irving  negotiated.  Upon 
another  block  of  the  same  thoroughfare  the 
Bank  of  Commerce  building  towers  upon  the 
place  where  Noah  Webster  lodged  when  he 
edited  The  Minerva  and  for  some  time  afterward, 
only  a  few  doors  distant  from  the  modest  dwell 
ing  which  had  once  been  a  residence  of  the 
author  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 

The  offices  of  Current  Literature,  of  which 
the  grandson  of  Bryant  is  chief  owner  and  that 
graceful  and  sympathetic  delineator  of  Creole 
character,  George  W.  Cable,  was  lately  editor, 
are  in  the  adjacent  Liberty  Street,  and  upon  the 
corner  of  Nassau  sometime  stood  the  seed-store 
of  Grant  Thorburn,— "  Laurie  Todd."  His 
garden,  according  to  Mrs.  Lamb,  was  once  upon 
the  site  of  the  iron-fronted  edifice  of  the  old 
Real  Estate  Exchange,  and  just  around  the  corner 
in  Nassau  Street,  in  rooms  adjoining  his  first 
shop,  he  nursed  through  an  attack  of  yellow 
fever  a  stripling  lad  who  lived  to  invent  Hoe's 
printing-press.  Almost  opposite  to  Thorburn's 
store,  his  rival  the  political  essayist  William 
29 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Cobbett    for    some     months     sold    seeds    and 
plants. 

A  few  rods  out  of  Broadway  in  Cortlandt  Street 
— a  locality  long  since  resigned  to  commerce — 
once  was  the  home  of  Mrs.  Renwick,  which 
was  long  a  cherished  resort  of  Irving  and  other 
literary  lights.  Its  charming  hostess — mother 
of  Professor  James  Renwick  and  sister  of  the 
learned  Jeffrey — was  a  native  of  the  lovely 
Scottish  Annandale,  where  Burns  saw  and  sang 
of  her  as  "  The  Blue-Eyed  Lassie"  and  later 
made  her  the  heroine  of  "  When  first  I  Saw  my 
Jeannie's  Face,"  a  lay  not  included  in  the  vol 
umes  of  his  verse,  concluding  with  the  lines, — 

"  While  men  have  eyes,  or  ears,  or  taste, 
She'll  always  find  a  lover." 

Her  "  twa  lovely  een  sae  bonnie  blue"  and  her 
charms  of  mind  and  heart  won  for  her  many 
admirers  during  her  widowhood  in  New  York  ; 
she  and  Irving  were  warmest  friends,  and  it  was 
her  hand  that  rooted  at  Sunnyside  the  ivy  from 
the  ruins  of  Scott's  "  fair  Melrose,"  which  now 
riots  upon  the  walls  of  Irving's  old  home.  A 
few  doors  below  Mrs.  Renwick's,  on  the  same 
street,  an  ample  old  house  held  a  triune  sister 
hood  of  wit  and  beauty,  toasted  by  the  gallants 
of  the  time  as  "The  Three  Graces."  Of 
3° 


Burns's  Blue-Eyed  Lassie — John  Street 

these  sisters,  the  oldest,  Mary  Fairlie,  was  Ir- 
ving's  especial  favorite  :  she  was  the  "  Sophy 
Sparkle"  of  his  "  Salmagundi"  papers,  "  the  fas 
cinating  Fairlie"  of  his  letters,  his  friend  and 
correspondent  for  many  years  :  some  of  his  most 
brilliant  epistles  were  addressed  to  her. 

In  Broadway  below  Cortlandt  the  Knicker 
bocker  Magazine  was  founded  by  Lewis  Gaylord 
Clark,  with  a  corps  of  able  contributors, — 
among  them  Robert  C.  Sands,  who  was  pre 
paring  an  article  for  the  first  number  at  the 
instant  of  his  fatal  seizure.  Dey  Street,  near 
by,  was  of  yore  the  dark  and  blood-stained  glen 
where  was  fought  the  famous  «*  Peach  War" 
between  the  burghers  and  the  Indians,  chroni 
cled  in  Knickerbocker's  veracious  history ;  and 
just  across  Broadway  the  passage  at  No.  17 
John  Street  marks  for  us  the  place  of  the  en 
trance  to  the  old  theatre  which  the  lads  Irving 
and  Paulding  used  surreptitiously  to  attend,  and 
where  these  embryo  authors  probably  saw  the 
young  and  pretty  Elizabeth  Arnold,  afterward 
the  mother  of  Poe,  who  played  here  in  1797  as 
Marcia  in  the  comedy  of  "  The  Spoiled  Child." 
In  the  old  church  across  the  street  George 
Whitefield  "  preached  like  a  lion,"  and  at  the 
boys'  school  next  door — long  replaced  by  a 
business  edifice — Dr.  Francis  was  a  pupil  with 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Irving,  and  heard  him  declaim  in  stentorian 
tones,  "  My  voice  is  still  for  war  !"  At  the 
corner  of  John  and  Dutch  Streets  a  four-story 
brick  warehouse  covers  the  site  of  the  wooden 
dwelling  where  was  passed  the  boyhood  of 
Philip  Hone,  a  founder  of  the  Mercantile  Li 
brary  Association  and  writer  of  the  graphic 
'*  Diary"  which  once  gained  for  him  the  title 
of  "  the  Knickerbocker  Pepys." 

The  warehouse  in  which  Halleck  was  for 
many  years  book-keeper  and  accountant  for 
Jacob  Barker,  although  threatened  with  demo 
lition,  still  stands  in  South  Street  a  little  below 
Burling  Slip  (John  Street)  :  it  is  now  used  for 
storage,  and  is  little  changed,  save  that  a  glass 
partition,  which  divided  the  office,  where  the 
author  of  "  Marco  Bozzaris"  was  employed, 
from  the  store,  has  been  removed.  The  ad 
joining  warehouse  of  the  short-lived  firm  of 
Halleck  &  Barker  has  been  altered  somewhat 
more ;  the  neighborhood  is  quieter,  and  the 
number  of  bowsprits  that  project  across  the 
street  and  "  threaten  the  office  windows"  mani 
festly  smaller,  than  in  Halleck's  day.  A  quaint 
two-storied  dwelling  at  131  William  Street, 
above  John,  was  supplanted  many  years  ago  by 
a  store,  whose  front  is  soon  to  be  embellished, 
by  the  Authors  Club,  with  a  tablet  setting  forth 
32 


Halleck — living's  Birthplace 

the  fact  that  Irving  was  born  there.  At  an 
early  age  he  was  removed  to  No.  128,  a  house 
of  Dutch  design  and  of  Dutch  bricks,  which 
stood  within  a  garden,  upon  the  opposite  side 
of  the  street,  and  here  he  grew  to  physical  man 
hood.  One  who  saw  this  dwelling  with  Irving 
has  described  it  to  the  writer  as  a  two-storied 
edifice  with  curious  attic  windows  in  each  of  its 
four  steep  gables,  with  a  side  entrance  from  the 
yard,  built  of  narrow  bricks  like  those  now  to 
be  seen  in  the  front  of  the  yet  older  building 
standing  two  doors  below.  Two  windows  of 
the  second  story  were  pointed  out  by  Irving  as 
belonging  to  his  own  sleeping-apartment ;  be 
neath  these  the  roof  of  a  wood-shed  once  declined 
to  the  enclosing  fence  and  afforded  the  lad  the 
means  by  which  he  stole  out,  after  compulsory 
attendance  at  family  prayers,  to  rejoin  his  friend 
Paulding  in  the  pit  of  the  John  Street  theatre, 
not  many  rods  away. 

Around  the  corner,  at  107  Fulton  Street,  the 
poets  George  P.  Morris  and  Nathaniel  P.  Willis 
established,  in  1846,  The  Home  Journal,  which 
has  numbered  among  its  contributors  some  of  the 
brightest  writers  in  American  literature.  At  the 
Broadway  corner  of  this  street  are  the  offices  of 
the  Evening  Post,  the  paper  which  Bryant  edited 
during  the  greater  part  of  his  life ;  we  find,  by 
3  33 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

the  south  window  of  a  little  room  on  the  upper 
floor,  the  place  where  he  habitually  sat,  and 
where  he  was  employed  in  correcting  proofs  on 
the  morning  of  his  last  day  of  conscious  life. 
The  window  at  his  side  then  commanded  a  wide 
prospect  of  the  lower  city,  within  its  "  shore  of 
ships,"  and  upon  this  the  poet  loved  to  look  in 
the  pauses  of  his  work.  The  graceful  Willis 
whilom  dwelt  at  184  Fulton  Street,  beyond 
Broadway,  within  a  few  doors  of  the  school  in 
which  Ray  Palmer  was  a  teacher  at  the  time  he 
composed  America's  best  contribution  to  Chris 
tian  hymnology,  ••  My  faith  looks  up  to  Thee." 


34 


II 

ABOUT  AND   ABOVE    CITY 
HALL    PARK 

Clarke-Bryant-Poe-Irving-  Greeley  -  Cozzens-Curtis-Payne- 
Old-time  Resorts-Drake-Dana-Halleck-  Cooper-Bayard 
Taylor  -  Hoffman  -  Stoddard  -  Woodiuorth  -  Hoiuells'' s 
Scenes  -  Mrs.  Lathrop  -  Scott's  "  Rebecca" '  -  Aldrich  - 
Pfajf s-Burr-Paine-Bret  Harte-Many  Others. 

/^\UR  strolling  pilgrimage  through  the  older 
city  has  led  us  to  the  vicinity  of  the  City 
Hall  Park, — the  "  Common"  of  the  period  to 
which  pertain  many  of  the  shrines  we  have  thus 
far  found.  In  the  time  before  it  was  shorn  of 
its  shrubbery  and  despoiled  of  its  fair  dimen 
sions,  the  park  was  the  resort  of  poor  McDonald 
Clarke,  author  of  "  The  Elixir  of  Moonshine, 
By  the  Mad  Poet,"  and  other  volumes,  who 
often  sat  out  the  night  in  this  place  when  even 
the  old  hearse  was  not  available  as  a  lodging,  and 
perhaps  it  was  while  gazing  into  starlit  heaven 
during  some  nocturnal  vigil  here  that  he  com 
posed  the  exquisite  lines, — 

"  Night  dropped  her  sable  curtain  down 
And  pinned  it  with  a  star." 

The  pavement  at  the  south  end  of  the  old  park 

was  the  scene  of  a  violent  personal  encounter 

35 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

between  Bryant  and  William  L.  Stone, — author 
of  "  Border  Wars  of  the  Revolution,"  etc., — 
which  provoked  much  comment  among  the 
writers  of  the  day  and  which  was  witnessed  and 
described  by  the  noted  diarist,  Philip  Hone, 
from  the  window  of  his  residence,  which  stood 
upon  the  site  of  the  present  No.  235  on  the 
opposite  side  of  Broadway,  one  door  below 
Park  Place.  Near  by  in  Ann  Street  once  dwelt 
a  Mr.  Cockloft,  whose  name  suggested  the  ap 
pellation  of  the  family  and  hall  in  "  Salmagundi ;" 
and  at  the  corner  of  Ann  and  Nassau  Poe  was 
employed  by  Willis  upon  The  Evening  Mirror, 
in  which — January  29,  1845 — "The  Raven'* 
was  first  reprinted  under  the  name  of  Poe,  with 
Willis's  comment  declaring  it  to  be  the  most 
effective  example  of  fugitive  poetry  ever  pub 
lished  in  America. 

For  several  years  Irving  lived  with  his  wid 
owed  mother  on  the  northwest  corner  of  Ann 
and  William  Streets  in  a  quaint  old  house,  long 
ago  removed,  whose  structural  bricks  and  archi 
tectural  style  are  now  illustrated  by  the  lower 
stories  of  a  contemporary  building  at  No.  167 
William,  a  few  doors  above.  In  this  home,  at 
the  age  of  nineteen,  Irving  wrote  the  humorous 
"Jonathan  Oldstyle"  essays  which  procured  for 
him  the  friendship  of  the  novelist  Charles 
36 


Homes  of  Irving,  etc. — Windust's 

Brockden  Brown  and  of  Joseph  Dennie  of  The 
Port  Folio  y — some  of  whose  peculiarities  are  de 
picted  in  "  Salmagundi," — who  visited  Irving 
here.  Here,  too,  Irving  produced  most  of  his 
contributions  to  "  Salmagundi"  and  wrote  the 
wonderful  "  History  of  New  York"  which  made 
him  known  round  the  world. 

Just  below  the  old  park,  by  the  corner  of 
Vesey  Street,  once  stood  the  domicik  of  the 
founder  of  the  Astor  Library,  whose  personal 
qualities  drew  to  him  here  such  men  as  Irving, 
Francis,  and  Halleck ;  a  little  way  down  Vesey 
Street  a  wine-shop  stands  upon  the  site  of  a 
quondam  dwelling  of  that  lucid  and  trenchant 
writer,  Horace  Greeley ;  opposite  was  some 
time  the  office  of  Paulding,  and  a  few  doors 
below  is  the  store  which  once  belonged  to  the 
genial  Frederick  S.  Cozzens  of  "  Sparrowgrass 
Papers,"  who  here  published  the  periodical  from 
which  was  gathered  the  material  for  his  "  Say 
ings  of  Dr.  Bushwacker  and  other  Learned 
Men." 

Facing  the  park  upon  the  east  stood  of  yore 
the  shop  of  David  Longworth, — called  by  Ir 
ving  and  his  friends  "  Dusky  Davie,"  from  a 
popular  song  of  the  time, — who  published  "  Sal 
magundi  ;"  upon  the  same  spot,  now  occupied 
by  a  shop,  Edward  Windust,  who  was  nick- 
37 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

named  from  the  legend  upon  his  sign-board  "  Old 
Semper  Paratus,"  kept  some  decades  later  a  re 
fectory  which  was  the  especial  haunt  of  theatrical 
artists  and  literary  Bohemians,  among  them  being 
John  Brougham  and  the  collaborators  upon  The 
Lantern.  Adjacent,  upon  the  place  of  the  pres 
ent  mammoth  Syndicate  Building,  was  the  Park 
Theatre,  of  which  Irving's  friend,  the  tragedian 
Thomas  A.  Cooper,  who  married  the  Sophy 
Sparkle  of  "  Salmagundi,"  was  manager :  an 
address  for  Cooper's  opening  night  was  the 
longest  poem  Irving  ever  wrote.  Here  in  1809 
the  future  author  of  "  Sweet  Home" — then  a 
stripling  lad  who  had  abandoned  his  studies  to 
go  upon  the  stage  in  order  to  maintain  his  help 
less  father  and  family — made  his  first  appearance 
as  Norval  in  "  Douglas,"  took  the  town  by  storm, 
and  gained  for  himself  the  title  of  the  "  Young 
American  Roscius  ;"  he  last  appeared  here  two 
years  later,  playing  Edgar  to  Cooke's  Lear. 
Here,  two  decades  afterward,  Fanny  Kemble — 
subsequently  famed  as  a  poet — made  her  first 
bow  to  a  New  York  audience.  Dyde's  "  fash 
ionable  London  Hotel,"  just  above  the  theatre, 
was  an  habitual  resort  of  the  Cockloft  Hall 
coterie  of  Irving's  chums,  and 

"  To  riot  at  Dyde's  on  imperial  champagne 
And  then  scour  the  city — the  peace  to  maintain," 
38 


Park  Theatre — Drake — Dunlap 

was,  according  to  the  poet  of  "  Salmagundi,"  a 
characteristic  of  the  "  Sad  Dogs"  of  that  day. 

Next  door  to  the  corner  of  Beekman  Street 
was  the  pharmacy  of  Joseph  Rodman  Drake, 
considered  by  Halleck  the  handsomest  man  in 
New  York,  who  resided  above  his  store,  in  rooms 
to  which  the  author  of  "  Fanny"  was  a  frequent 
visitor.  Here  the  two  friends,  whom  General 
Wilson  styles  "  the  Damon  and  Pythias  of  Amer 
ican  poets,"  produced  some  of  their  whimsical 
"  Croaker"  verses ;  here  Drake's  most  popular 
poem,  "  The  American  Flag,"  was  written,  the 
concluding  stanza  being  the  composition  of  his 
friend ;  and  here  he  languished  in  consumption 
and  died  at  the  early  age  of  twenty-five.  Around 
the  corner  in  Beekman  Street  the  Temple  Court 
covers  the  place  of  an  office  of  Poe's  short-lived 
Broadway  Journal,  and  a  few  doors  below  it, 
at  118  Nassau,  was  published  The  American 
Review,  in  which,  above  the  signature  of 
"  Quarles,"  first  appeared  "  The  Raven,"  the 
imperishable  poem  which  procured  for  Poe 
world-wide  fame.  In  rooms  in  a  brick  dwelling 
upon  the  second  block  of  Beekman  Street,  Wil 
liam  Dunlap  wrote  his  biographies  of  Cooke  and 
Charles  Brockden  Brown  and  his  histories  of  the 
"American  Theatre"  and  the  "  Arts  of  Design." 
A  four-story  house  just  out  of  Beekman  in  Pearl 
39 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Street  was  the  abode  of  the  quizzical  Cozzens 
before  he  removed  to  Yonkers  and  became 
"  Mr.  Sparrowgrass,"  and  a  block  northward  are 
Franklin  Square  and  the  publishing  establish 
ment  where  "  the  American  Elia,"  George  Wil 
liam  Curtis,  sat  in  the  "  Easy  Chair"  and  con 
ducted  Harper's  Weekly.  In  an  upper  room  of 
the  building  that  adventurous  explorer  and  vivid 
writer,  Paul  B.  Du  Chaillu,  composed  the  most 
of  his  book  upon  "  Equatorial  Africa." 

The  old  Tribune  building,  which  faced  the 
park  at  the  corner  of  Spruce  Street  and  with 
which  Greeley  was  so  long  associated,  has  been 
replaced  by  a  modern  structure  in  front  of  which 
sits  a  colossal  statue  of  that  forceful  writer  ;  at 
the  back  of  this  new  building,  a  dingy  edifice — 
still  "  difficult  as  to  stairs  and  dark  as  to  pas 
sages" — was  the  habitation  of  the  Bohemian 
Saturday  Press  to  which  Howells  made  the  visit 
which  gave  him  the  very  first  of  his  "  First  Im 
pressions  of  Literary  New  York."  At  the  next 
corner  of  Newspaper  Row  is  the  painted-brick 
edifice  in  which  the  late  Charles  A.  Dana — both 
author  and  poet,  but  best  known  as  editor — di 
rected  the  journalistic  luminary  that  "  shines  for 
all ;"  here  the  Nestor  of  American  journalism 
worked  in  a  small,  irregular,  corner  room  of  the 
third  story,  whose  furnishings  give  no  hint  of 
40 


Greeley — Dana — Putnam's  Magazine 

the  aesthetic  culture  of  its  former  occupant.  An 
oaken  writing-table,  with  a  revolving  case  of 
books  upon  it  and  Dana's  large  chair  in  front  of 
it,  occupies  the  centre  of  the  room,  a  smaller 
table  holding  books  and  papers  stands  by  a  side 
window,  a  leather-covered  couch  is  against  one 
wall,  an  inexpensive  rug  is  upon  the  floor,  and 
these,  with  some  photographs  and  prints  upon 
the  cerulean-tinted  walls  and  a  stuffed  owl  which 
solemnly  surveys  the  scene  from  the  top  of  the 
rotary  bookcase,  constitute  the  furniture  of  this 
workshop  of  the  foremost  man  in  his  profession. 
Save  that  his  son  now  sits  in  Dana's  accustomed 
place  by  the  table,  naught  is  changed  since  the 
day  he  was  last  here  engaged  upon  his  editorial 
tasks.  Upon  the  next  floor,  in  the  office  of  the 
Evening  Sun,  Richard  Harding  Davis  wrote 
some  of  his  earlier  "  Van  Bibber"  stories. 

West  of  the  old  park,  a  store  at  No.  5  Barclay 
Street  has  long  supplanted  the  once  famous 
"  Frank's"  restaurant  which,  like  Will's  Coffee- 
House  in  London,  was  a  haunt  of  the  writers 
and  actors  of  the  time, — Hoffman,  Poe,  Halleck, 
Morris,  Burton,  Herbert,  Clarke,  and  Brougham 
being  among  those  often  seen  here.  In  an 
upper  front  room  of  a  building  at  10  Park  Place, 
Charles  F.  Briggs, — better  known  as  "  Harry 
Franco,"  from  his  articles  in  the  Knickerbocker, 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

— with  Parke  Godwin  and  George  William 
Curtis  as  assistants,  conducted  Putnam's,  that 
excellent  magazine  whose  financial  failure  in 
dicated  the  decadence  of  New  York's  literary 
preeminence  :  a  spacious  old  house  a  little  way 
westward  in  the  same  thoroughfare,  and  now 
replaced  by  stores,  was  once  the  residence  of 
Jerome  Villagrand,  with  whom  Halleck  boarded 
many  years.  While  living  here,  Halleck  gave 
forth  his  first  volume  of  poems  ;  later  Villagrand 
removed  to  a  smaller  domicile  around  the  corner, 
in  what  is  now  West  Broadway,  where  Halleck 
entertained  Prince  Louis  Napoleon.  In  near-by 
Greenwich  Street  William  Irving  lived  when 
he  ground  the  verse  "  from  the  mill  of  Pindar 
Cockloft"  for  "  Salmagundi,"  and  in  the  same 
dwelling  Paulding  composed  his  share  of  the 
whimsicalities  of  that  droll  publication  ;  above 
on  this  street  James  Fenimore  Cooper — already 
famous  as  the  author  of  "  The  Spy" — resided 
when  Bryant  removed  to  the  city  and  was  in 
vited  to  the  novelist's  house  to  meet  many 
literary  celebrities. 

A  five-storied  building  in  Murray  Street,  a 
few  steps  out  of  Broadway,  was  Bayard  Taylor's 
first  abode  after  he  had  been  attracted  to  the 
metropolis  by  the  opportunities  of  its  literary 
life.  The  brilliant  Charles  Fenno  Hoffman — 
42 


Halleck — hooper — Taylor — Hoffman 

author  of  "  Greyslaer"  and  other  books,  but 
best  remembered  as  the  poet  of  "  Monterey" 
and  "Sparkling  and  Bright" — lodged  in  the 
same  house ;  Hoffman,  who  already  displayed 
in  his  eccentricities  symptoms  of  the  mental 
malady  which  for  thirty-four  years  separated 
him  from  his  kind,  enjoyed  the  dignity  of  a 
"first-floor-front,"  while  Taylor's  light  purse 
made  it  easier  for  him  to  climb  four  flights 
towards  the  empyrean.  In  his  attic  here  he 
"  rested  his  soul  with  poetry  after  the  prosaic 
labors  of  the  day,"  and  produced  such  poems  as 
"  Kubleh,"  "  Ariel  in  the  Cloven  Pirre,"  "  Ode 
to  Shelley,"  and  the  best  of  his  classical  verse, 
"  Hylas  ;"  here  he  received  as  visitors  Kimball, 
Griswold,  Buchanan  Read, — who  portrayed 
Taylor  in  the  Arthur  of  his  "  Home  Pastorals," 
— and  Richard  Henry  Stoddard.  The  latter 
came  often,  after  a  week's  drudgery  in  the 
foundry,  to  enjoy  with  his  friend 

"  The  sunshine  of  the  gods, 

The  hour  of  perfect  song," 

reading  and  discussing  the  stanzas  each  had 
written  since  their  last  meeting,  and  discoursing 
of  poetry  and  poets. 

A  few  rods  northward  we  find,  in  Chambers 
Street,  business  structures  occupying  the  site  of 
43 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

the  office-residence  of  Dr.  John  W.  Francis, 
where  that  intimate  of  literary  men  welcomed 
Jeffrey,  Cooper,  Sparks,  Irving,  Payne,  Dun- 
lap,  and  corresponded  with  Southey,  Cobbett, 
Moore,  Cuvier,  and  many  of  similar  genius. 
Not  far  away  on  the  same  street  erst  stood 
Palmo's  Opera-House,  where  Samuel  Lover, 
author  of"  Rory  O'More"  and  "  Handy  Andy," 
read  from  his  own  works  and  sang  his  own 
songs,  and  where  de  Singeeron  sold  sweets  upon 
the  sidewalk.  The  father  of  Halleck's  "  Fanny" 
had  his  shop  in  the  adjacent  Chatham  Street ; 
here  Walt  Whitman  laid  the  scene  of  the  homi 
cide  in  "One  Wicked  Impulse;"  at  No.  85 
Greeley  first  found  occupation  in  West's  print 
ing-office,  and  around  in  Duane  Street  Wood- 
worth  lived  when  he  penned  "  The  Old  Oaken 
Bucket."  It  has  been  so  generally  believed  the 
poem  was  written  or  conceived  in  a  tap-room 
that  the  survivors  of  the  poet's  family  desire 
publicity  for  the  following  account.  At  noon 
of  a  warm  day  in  the  summer  of  1817,  Wood- 
worth  walked  home  to  dinner  from  his  office 
near  the  foot  of  Wall  Street,  and,  being  greatly 
heated,  drank  a  tumbler  of  pump-water,  and 
said  as  he  replaced  the  glass,  "  How  much  more 
refreshing  would  be  a  draught  from  the  old 
bucket  that  hung  in  my  father's  well !"  Where- 
44 


Writing  "Old  Oaken  Bucket" 

upon  his  wife,  who,  the  poet  declared,  was  his 
habitual  source  of  inspiration,  exclaimed,  "Why, 
Selim,  wouldn't  that  be  a  pretty  subject  for  a 
poem  ?"  Thus  prompted,  he  at  once  com 
menced  and  within  the  hour  completed  the 
charming  lyric  which  perpetuates  his  name. 
Years  later  he  was  living  in  a  larger  house,  now 
supplanted  by  stores,  upon  the  next  block  in 
Pearl  Street  near  Elm  :  to  him  here  came  Irving, 
Morris,  Poe,  Fay,  Willis,  and  others  of  kindred 
talent ;  here  Halleck  addressed  his  lines  "  To  a 
Poet's  Daughter"  to  Woodworth's  oldest  daugh 
ter  Harriet,  whose  "grave-mound  greenly  swells" 
in  a  Western  village  cemetery,  where  she  has 
lain  for  fifty  years.  In  this  house,  after  six 
years  of  hemiplegia,  Woodworth  died :  so  en 
tirely  does  his  fame  rest  upon  the  single  mem 
orable  song  that  most  readers  will  be  surprised 
when  told  that  he  wrote  several  volumes  of 
poetry,  plays,  and  prose. 

A  little  way  along  Elm  Street  we  come  to  the 
place  of  the  Collect  Pond  (where  the  young 
officer  who  later  was  King  William  IV.  of  Eng 
land  learned  to  skate),  long  covered  by  the  city 
prison,  in  which  died  McDonald  Clarke, — hero 
of  Halleck's  "  Discarded,"  and  himself  the  writer 
of  many  tender  and  graceful  poems, — who,  being 
found  destitute  and  demented  in  the  streets  and 
45 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

placed  here  for  safety,  drowned  himself  in  his 
cell.  East  of  the  prison  and  once  overlooking 
Collect  Pond  would  be  the  site  of  the  "  Inde 
pendent  Columbian  Hotel  in  Mulberry  Street," 
— reputed  sojourn  of  Diedrich  Knickerbocker, 
who  here  prepared  the  manuscript  which  he  left 
behind  with  his  unpaid  reckoning  when  he  dis 
appeared.  The  place  of  Handaside's  hostelry 
would  be  in  the  little  park  which  now  admits 
air  and  sunshine  into  the  foul  region  of  Mul 
berry  Bend,  amid  whose  squalor  the  "  Altrurian 
Traveller"  discovered  a  picturesque  quaintness, 
and  the  artist,  in  one  of  Professor  Matthews's 
charming  "Vignettes,"  made  his  successful  search 
for  "local  color."  Hard  by  lies  the  quieter 
street  where  Basil  March,  in  "  A  Hazard  of 
New  Fortunes,"  found  stanch  old  Lindeau  living 
among  the  poor  in  order  that  he  might  not  for 
get  their  sufferings  and  wrongs ;  and  in  Mott 
Street  we  see  the  same  thronging  pagans  March 
beheld  there,  and  the  statue  looking  down  upon 
them  from  the  front  of  the  old  church,  and  ob 
serve  that  the  image  is  not  that  of  a  saint,  as 
Howells  supposed,  but  of  the  Christ.  A  few 
rods  distant,  at  the  northwest  corner  of  the 
Bowery  and  Pell  Street,  a  saloon  covers  the  site 
of  the  old  house  in  which  Mrs.  Rowson's 
wretched  heroine  "  Charlotte  Temple"  died. 
46 


Knickerbocker — Howells — Drake 

A  short  walk  through  the  present  hideousness 
of  the  Bowery  brings  us  to  the  place  where  "  J. 
Rodman  Drake,  M.D.,"  first  displayed  his  sign 
at  No.  1 21;  to  this  office  the  devoted  Halleck 
came  most  frequently,  from  here  the  friends 
made  their  many  excursions,  here  Drake  sang 
of  his  "  own  romantic  Bronx,"  by  whose  tide 
he  now  sleeps  in  death,  and  here,  in  a  period  of 
less  than  three  days,  he  wrote  "  The  Culprit 
Fay,"  which  Halleck  then  thought  the  finest 
poem  of  its  kind  in  the  English  tongue. 

At  the  lower  end  of  the  Bowery  is  Chatham 
Square,  with  its  crowded  pavements  and  turmoil 
of  trains,  trucks,  and  teams,  which  has  riot  lost 
one  of  its  picturesque  features  since  Howells  so 
graphically  described  it, — even  the  ballad-seller 
is  to  be  seen  when  a  vacant  store-front  is  avail 
able, — and  a  stroll  thence  along  East  Broadway 
will  bring  us  to  the  vicinage  of  the  congested 
tenement  district  (the  most  populous  in  Chris 
tendom)  of  Howells's  "East  Side  Ramble,"  and 
the  scene  of  the  labors  of  Conrad  Dryfoos  and 
Margaret  Vance  in  "  A  Hazard  of  New  For 
tunes."  In  East  Broadway,  a  neighborhood  now 
surrendered  to  the  children  of  Israel,  the  build 
ing  of  the  Educational  Alliance  covers  the  place 
of  the  plain  brick  house,  No.  195,  upon  whose 
upper  floor  Poe  dwelt  when  the  youthful  Richard 
47 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Henry  Stoddard  called  upon  him  and  saw  his 
sick  wife  asleep  upon  a  couch ;  a  three-storied 
house  standing  beyond  Clinton  Street  was,  a  little 
later,  the  residence  of  the  senior  Henry  James. 
Farther  eastward,  in  Cherry  Street  near  Scam- 
mel,  was  the  foundry  of  Thomas  Bent,  in  which 
Stoddard  worked  at  the  time  he  published  his 
first  volume  of  verse  and  began  his  intimacy  with 
Bayard  Taylor ;  and  a  coal-yard  in  Stanton 
Street,  between  Lewis  and  Goerck,  now  occu 
pies  part  of  the  site  of  another  foundry,  in  which 
he  learned  the  art  of  iron-moulding  after  he  had 
commenced  the  practice  of  the  poetic  art.  A 
shabby  frame  house  in  Water  Street,  obviously 
older  than  the  building  where  Stoddard  was  em 
ployed  on  the  same  block,  is  the  present  home 
and  hospital  of  the  gifted  Mrs.  Lathrop, — 
daughter  of  the  great  Hawthorne  and  born  in 
"  the  golden  chamber'*  of  his  Berkshire  home, 
— who  has  relinquished  her  loved  literary  occu 
pations  and  her  life  of  cultured  ease  and  has  come 
to  dwell  amid  the  most  uncongenial  and  dis 
tasteful  surroundings  in  order  to  devote  herself 
to  the  personal  care  of  indigent  and  incurable 
cancerous  patients. 

The  long  reach  of  Broadway  above  the  City 
Hall,    once    the    fashionable   promenade   where 
48 


Stoddard — Lathrop — Scott's  Rebecca 

Willis  walked — "the  best-dressed  man  on 
Broadway" — and  met  upon  the  sidewalks  the 
heroines  of  his  "  Unseen  Spirits,"  has  other  and 
more  precious  literary  associations.  At  the  cor 
ner  of  Reade  Street,  now  covered  by  the  Stewart 
building,  long  stood  Washington  Hall,  the  usual 
meeting-place  of  the  Bread  and  Cheese  Club, — 
so  called  because  in  voting  for  membership  bread 
was  used  for  affirmative  and  cheese  for  negative 
ballots.  It  was  composed  of  such  men  as 
Cooper,  Halleck,  Bryant,  Verplanck,  Sands, 
Percival,  "  Major  Jack  Downing,"  Dr.  Francis, 
but  its  projector,  Cooper,  was  its  leading  spirit, 
and  it  speedily  languished  when  he  went  abroad. 
Its  successor  here  was  Wainwright's  Book  Club, 
made  up  largely  from  the  membership  of  the 
older  club.  In  a  spacious  deep-roomed  mansion 
which  stood  by  the  corner  of  Leonard  Street 
Irving  courted  the  lovely  Matilda  Hoffman ;  here 
he  saw  her  waste  and  fade,  "  becoming  more 
angelic  every  day,"  and  here,  looking  last  upon 
his  face,  she  died,  to  be  mourned  of  him  ever 
more.  Here,  too,  Irving  met  the  beautiful 
Jewess  Rebecca  Gratz,  the  devoted  friend  of  his 
affianced  and  her  constant  attendant  in  her  last 
illness:  years  afterwards,  when  visiting  Scott  at 
Abbotsford,  Irving  gave  such  an  account  of  her 
wonderful  beauty  and  constancy  that  the  "  Wiz- 
4  49 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

ard  of  the  North"  pictured  her  in  that  best  and 
most  romantic  conception  of  female  character  in 
all  his  fiction,  the  Rebecca  of  "  Ivanhoe." 

Cooper  sometime  lived  in  a  plain  little  brick 
house  above  Prince  Street ;  almost  opposite  was 
No.  585,  the  old-fashioned  home  of  Astor  and 
resort  of  Halleck,  Bristed,  and  Irving,  where 
the  latter  wrote  a  portion  of  his  "  Life  of  Wash 
ington  ;"  and  just  around  the  corner  in  Prince 
Street  a  great  store  covers  the  place  of  the  office 
where,  according  to  General  Wilson,  Halleck's 
desk  stood  near  the  east  front  window  during  the 
years  he  was  Astor's  secretary.  A  little  way 
eastward,  near  the  corner  of  Prince  and  Mul 
berry  Streets,  in  the  peaceful  God's-acre  adjoin 
ing  the  old  cathedral,  the  Venetian  poet,  Lorenzo 
Daponte,  who  died  in  the  next  block  of  Spring 
Street  at  the  age  of  ninety  and  was  followed  to 
his  burial  by  mourners  like  Woodworth,  Ver- 
planck,  Halleck,  and  Francis,  moulders  in  an 
unmarked  grave.  Near  by,  crowded  between 
tall  edifices,  is  the  diminutive  Jersey  Street  of 
Bunner's  delightful  "Jersey  Street  and  Jersey 
Lane."  The  basement  of  a  store  in  Broadway 
two  or  three  doors  above  Bleecker  was,  before 
the  civil  war,  Charles  Pfaff's  beer-cellar, — sung 
by  the  bards  of  Vanity  Fair  and  The  Saturday 
Press, — the  nightly  haunt  of  the  brightest  of 
50 


FfafPs— Home  of  Dr.  Francis 

New  York's  literary  Bohemians,  who  came  here 
to  smoke  and  quaff.  To  this  group  belonged 
Aldrich,  Winter,  Whitman,  Charles  G.  Hal- 
pine,  Artemas  Ward,  Fitzhugh  Ludlow,  George 
Arnold  the  •*  poet  of  Beer,"  who  sang  •'  We  were 
very  merry  at  Pfaff's,"  and  Fitzjames  O'Brien,  the 
"  gvPsy  °f  letters."  Here  Stedman  and  Bayard 
Taylor  were  occasional  loungers,  and  hither  came 
Howells,  on  his  notable  first  visit  to  New  York, 
and  supped  at  the  table  under  the  sidewalk  and 
was  presented  to  Whitman.  Materially  the  base 
ment  must  have  been  but  a  dingy  place  at  its  best, 
and  its  immaterial  glory  is  long  departed ;  the 
entrance  is  removed,  and  the  recesses  which 
once  resounded  with  the  wit  and  merriment  of 
brilliant  souls  are  now  stored  with  merchandise. 
Around  the  next  corner,  at  No.  I  Bond  Street, 
its  site  now  occupied  by  a  mammoth  shop,  long 
stood  the  capacious  old-time  mansion  of  Dr. 
Francis,  to  which  during  some  decades  were  wel 
comed  men  eminent  in  letters  and  art,  whether 
residents  of  New  York  or  visitors  from  abroad  : 
scores  of  these  came  here  as  to  an  intellectual 
centre  and  made  the  house  known  in  the  Old 
World  as  well  as  in  the  New.  Here  Francis, 
himself  a  theme  of  Halleck,  Cozzens,  and  other 
authors,  wrote  his  "  Reminiscences  of  Sixty 
Years"  and  many  contributions  to  literature,  and 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

it  was  to  him  here  that  Cooper  came  on  the 
melancholy  last  visit  to  New  York,  from  which 
he  returned  to  his  beloved  Otsego  to  die  after  a 
few  weeks  of  suffering.  Near  Francis's  was  the 
home  of  Mrs.  Maria  Louise  Shew,  the  good 
angel  who  ministered  to  Poe  and  his  household 
in  their  illness  and  destitution  and  to  whom  he 
addressed  the  lines  beginning,  "  Of  all  who  hail 
thy  presence  as  the  morning ;"  her  house,  only 
lately  surrendered  to  trade,  was  his  haven  in  dis 
tress,  and  here  at  her  suggestion  he  made  the 
first  incomplete  draught  of  "  The  Bells."  The 
now  old  and  dingy  three-storied  brick  house  at 
43  Bond  was  for  years  a  sojourn  of  Irving's, 
being  at  the  time  the  abode  of  his  nephew, 
John  T.  Irving,  who  here  wrote  **  The  Attor 
ney"  and  "  Harry  Harson." 

If  our  stroll  northward  from  the  City  Hall 
Park  be  by  the  thoroughfares  lying  west  of 
Broadway,  we  find  in  Hudson  Street  a  great  store 
supplanting  the  home  of  Coleman,  to  which 
Drake  and  Halleck  came  privily  by  night  to  re 
veal  themselves  as  the  '  «Croaker"  and  "  Croaker 
junior"  of  the  witty  poems  Coleman  had  pub 
lished  in  the  Evening  Post.  At  84  Hudson 
whilom  stood  the  house  in  which  A  Boy  that 
Laurence  Hutton  Knew  was  born,  and  three 
doors  out  of  Hudson  in  North  Moore  Street 
52 


Aldrich — Bryant — Cooper — Burr 

sometime  lived  a  self-styled  "  Bad  Boy"  who 
grew  up  to  be  the  poet  Aldrich.  A  store  has 
replaced  the  modern  dwelling  No.  92  Hudson 
which  was  Bryant's  abode  when  he  succeeded 
Coleman  on  the  Post,  and  the  more  pretentious 
home  of  Burton,  a  little  above,  is  succeeded  by  a 
warehouse.  A  somewhat  shabby  brick  building, 
with  Venetian  shutters,  arched  doorway,  and 
rather  ornate  trimmings,  a  little  way  out  of  Hud 
son  in  Beach  Street,  was  the  first  city  residence 
of  Cooper,  who  wrote  here  "  The  Pilot"  and 
the  less  successful  novel  "  Lionel  Lincoln."  In 
the  adjacent  Varick  Street,  just  below  Canal,  a 
neighborhood  no  longer  select,  we  find  an  old 
red-brick  house,  with  white  stone  steps  and  lin 
tels,  to  which  Bryant  removed  from  Hudson 
Street,  and,  some  blocks  above  in  Varick,  the 
place  of  Burr's  Richmond  Hill,  which  long  ago 
disappeared  under  compact  masses  of  masonry. 
Sixty  years  ago  the  Richmond  Hill  Theatre  stood 
where  we  now  find  the  dwellings  numbered  34 
to  38  Charlton  Street,  east  of  Varick,  and  marked 
the  site  of  Burr's  villa,  which  had  been  lowered 
to  the  grade  of  the  street  and  converted  into  the 
play-house  at  whose  opening  Verplanck  read  a 
dedicatory  poem  written  by  Halleck.  At  the 
stately  old  villa  were  entertained  many  of  the 
most  eminent  men  of  the  time,  including  Louis 
53 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Philippe  and  such  writers  as  Talleyrand,  Paine, 
Volney,  and  Chateaubriand. 

A  two-storied  frame  house  which  some  years 
ago  disappeared  from  the  west  side  of  Carmine 
Street  above  Varick  was  Poe's  dwelling  for  a 
part  of  the  period  of  his  first  residence  in  New 
York  ;  it  was  here  that  the  bookseller  Gowans 
resided  with  him  most  of  the  eight  months  con 
cerning  which  he  afterward  testified,  "  During 
that  time  I  never  saw  him  the  least  affected  by 
liquor  nor  knew  him  to  descend  to  any  kind  of 
vice."  Here  Poe  completed  the  wonderful 
"  Narrative  of  Arthur  Gordon  Pym,"  which 
one  critic  regards  as  "  peerless  of  its  kind  after 
'  Gulliver's  Travels/  "  and  composed  the  artistic 
tale  of  "  Ligeia."  A  now  dingy  brick  building 
nearer  to  Bleecker  was,  for  some  years  after  his 
return  from  Hoboken,  Bryant's  «•  home  in  Car 
mine  Street"  to  which  his  letters  refer.  Out 
of  Carmine  opens  the  sober  thoroughfare  cele 
brated  in  Bunner's  lilting  "  Song  of  Bedford 
Street,"  where — as  the  present  writer  has  dis 
covered — backyard  floriculture  has  still  its  vo 
taries. 

In  near-by  Bleecker  Street,  near  Thompson,  in 

a  house  now  decorated  with  Italian  sign-boards 

and  displaying  evidences  of  the  gentility  of  its 

former  state  through  the  pathetic  shabbiness  of 

54 


Foe's  Dwelling — Cooper's — Paine 's 

the  present,  Cooper  first  erected  his  household 
gods  after  his  return  from  Europe, — French 
gods  these,  for  the  house  was  equipped  through 
out  with  furniture  he  had  brought  from  France, 
and  was  ministered  solely  by  French  servitors. 
Northward  on  Bleecker,  Mr.  Janvier  finds  for  us 
at  No.  293  the  site  of  the  house  where  Thomas 
Paine,  the  famous  author  of  "  The  Rights  of 
Man,"  dwelt  with  Madame  Bonneville,  and 
around  the  next  corner,  at  59  Grove,  the  place 
of  the  frame  structure  in  which  he  spent  his 
last  weeks  of  life  and  was  plied  by  parsons  Cun 
ningham  and  Milledollar.  A  spacious  double 
dwelling  of  painted  brick  which  is  yet  to  be 
seen  at  the  end  of  Grove  Street  in  Hudson  was 
a  boyhood  home  of  the  writer  of  "  The  Luck 
of  Roaring  Camp"  and  much  later  idealistic  fic 
tion,  Bret  Harte.  The  edifice  stands  next  door 
to  St.  Luke's  Church,  and  is  now  utilized  as  the 
parish  house.  In  that  portion  of  the  garden 
which  has  since  been  overbuilt  by  the  parochial 
school,  the  future  author  engaged  in  his  first 
pugilistic  encounter,  and  emerged  victorious — 
with  the  aid  of  his  mother,  as  the  other  boy 
remembers. 

And   here  we  have  reached   the  picturesque 
region  of  old  Greenwich,  with  its  bits  of  quaint- 
ness  which  delighted  the  "  Altrurian  Traveller" 
55 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

and  the  irregular  streets  through  which  Basil 
March  used  to  saunter  in  New  York's  greatest 
novel.  About  us  may  be  seen  the  now  broken 
rows  of  little  red  houses  with  the  old-fashioned 
oddities  he  noted,  and  somewhere  nearer  the 
river  lie  those  "  furthermost  tracks  westward" 
where  the  brave  Lindeau  and  the  devoted  Con 
rad  Dryfoos  of  Howells's  tale  came  to  their 
deaths  among  the  strikers. 


Ill 

THE    LATIN    QUARTER   AND 
ITS    ENVIRONS 


Hoiuells  —  James  -  Bayard  Taylor  —  Lathrop  —  De  Kay  —  Poe— 
Gilder— Bryant— Mrs.  Wiggin-Mrs.  Osgood—Stoddard— 
Godwin-  Greeley-  Cooper -Whitman -White -Stedman- 
Patti  —  Lotos  Club  —  Century  —  Bunner  —  Matthews  —  Du 
Chaillu-Alice  Cary-Gris<wold-Mrs.  Burton  Harrison- 
Irvingy  etc. 

AST  WARD  from  quaint  old  Greenwich 
lies  Washington  Square,  whose  vicinage, 
together  with  a  devious  and  doubtfully  defined 
district  bisected  by  Broadway  and  reaching  ir 
regularly  eastward  and  northward  as  far  as  Stuy- 
vesant  Square,  has  sometimes  been  styled  the 
"  Latin  Quarter"  of  New  York.  Within  this 
region  a  few  of  the  pioneer  American  authors, 
many  of  those  who  belonged  to  what  John 
Burroughs  calls  our  "  second  crop,"  and  a  still 
larger  number  of  authors  who  "  have  not  yet 
the  advantage  of  being  dead,"  have  or  have  had 
home  or  haunt. 

Washington   Square  has  itself  given  title  to 

one  of  Richard  Watson  Gilder's  poems  and  to 

a  tale  of  Henry  James  of  New  York  life :    at 

No.  21  of  the  adjacent  Washington  Place  that 

57 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

subtly  realistic  novelist  was  born  and  his  father, 
"the  seer,"  wrote  some  of  his  metaphysical 
treatises.  We  may  be  sure  that  the  school  kept 
by  "  a  broad-bosomed,  broad-based  old  lady  with 
a  ferule,"  of  which  young  James  had  knowledge, 
was  not  far  distant,  and,  if  we  sit  of  a  summer 
evening  with  Howells's  Marches  among  the  old 
trees  of  the  Square,  we  see  just  north  of  it  the 
"  wide-fronted  house  with  a  big  balcony  before 
its  drawing-room  windows"  and  with  steps  and 
trimmings  of  white  marble  in  which  dwelt  the 
Dr.  Sloper  of  James's  tale  with  his  dull  daughter 
and  her  plotting  aunt.  Another  marble  and 
brick  dwelling  of  the  same  row  is  that  from 
which  Kitty,  the  heroine  of  one  of  Bunner's 
merry  "  Ballads  of  the  Town,"  disappeared  to 
go  "  summering"  in  a  studio  building  on  the 
other  side  of  the  Square.  Fronting  the  old 
park,  also,  was  the  residence  of  Professor  Mat- 
thews's  Mrs.  Martin,  the  portly  and  majestic 
"  Duchess  of  Washington  Square,"  and  the 
scene  of  the  dinner  in  "  Love  at  First  Sight." 
In  another  direction  we  see,  above  and  beyond 
the  shadows  of  the  park,  the  glowing  "  Cross 
of  Light"  of  Gilder's  poem  looming  from  the 
sacred  tower  against  the  evening  sky  and  turning 
the  old  Square  to  holy  ground. 

It  was  near  by  that  N.  P.  Willis  suffered  a 
58 


Around  Washington  Square 

flagellation  from  Edwin  Forrest,  provoked  by 
the  poet's  conduct  and  criticisms  in  regard  to 
the  actor's  divorce  litigation.  In  a  small  apart 
ment  beneath  the  gray  Norman  battlements  of 
the  old  University  building,  which  overlooked 
the  Square  from  the  east,  Theodore  Winthrop 
wrote  "  Cecil  Dreeme"  and  other  stories  which 
obtained  for  him,  after  his  untimely  death,  the 
reputation  denied  him  in  life.  Charles  de  Kay, 
brother-in-law  of  Gilder  and  grandson  of  J. 
Rodman  Drake,  had  bachelor  chambers  in  the 
same  edifice,  and  here  produced  "  The  Bohe 
mian,"  the  "  Hesperus"  volume  of  verse,  the 
"  Love  Poems  of  Barnaval,"  and  the  imaginative 
poetry  of  oriental  scenes  and  themes  found  in 
his  "  Vision  of  Nimrod"  and  "  Esther."  Here, 
too,  Stephen  Bonsai  resided  for  a  considerable 
time. 

A  dwelling  which  stood  opposite  the  north 
west  corner  of  the  Square  was  for  some  years 
the  home  of  Bayard  Taylor,  and  here  he  ad 
dressed  to  Stoddard  the  "  Epistle  from  Mount 
Tmolus"  and  composed  some  of  the  "  Poems 
of  the  Orient"  and  others  of  similar  excellence. 
In  the  large  apartment  house  which  now  covers 
the  site  of  Taylor's  residence  George  Parsons 
Lathrop  sometime  lived  and  wrote  short  stories 
and  sketches  and  some  of  the  verse  of  his 
59 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

"  Dreams  and  Days ;"  here  his  gifted  wife, 
Rose  Hawthorne,  composed  portions  of  her 
poetical  volume  "  Along  the  Shore,"  and  here, 
too,  at  the  same  time,  lived  John  A.  Mitchell, 
the  author  of  "  Amos  Judd."  Just  beyond,  in 
Waverley  Place,  the  house  has  recently  been 
rebuilt  in  which  the  poet  of  "  The  Battle  of 
Life,"  etc.,  Anne  Lynch,  lived  with  her  mother 
and  commenced  the  receptions  which  Taylor 
lauded  in"  John  Godfrey's  Fortunes"  and  which 
attracted  many  of  the  best  and  brightest  in 
letters  and  art.  Among  those  who  came  to  this 
house  were  the  priestess  of  transcendentalism, 
Margaret  Fuller,  and  Elizabeth  Oakes  Smith 
(wife  of  the  original  Major  Jack  Downing),  then 
famous  as  the  writer  of  "  The  Sinless  Child," 
which  Poe  considered  one  of  the  most  original 
of  American  long  poems ;  here  Poe  sometimes 
came  with  his  pale  invalid  wife,  and  once  he 
read  aloud  the  newly  published  "  Raven"  with 
indescribably  thrilling  effect.  A  few  doors  dis 
tant,  in  the  brick  house  No.  108,  Richard  Hard 
ing  Davis  resided  for  two  or  three  years,  and  in 
the  front  room  of  the  second  story  wrote  por 
tions  of  his  "Van  Bibber"  and  other  delightful 
stories.  A  floor  of  a  dingy  old  brick  building 
standing  near  in  Sixth  Avenue  was  the  home  of 
Poe  for  a  portion  of  the  time  Gowans  dwelt 
60 


Lathrop — Mrs.  Botta — Poe — Davis 

with  him  ;  here  he  "  expended  his  spirit"  upon 
the  extravagant  "  Signora  Psyche  Zenobia"  and 
that  artistically  faultless  tale  "  The  Fall  of  the 
House  of  Usher,"  which,  with  "  Ligeia,"  Prof. 
Woodberry  regards  as  "  marking  the  highest 
reach  of  the  romantic  element  in  Poe's  genius," 
corresponding  in  richness  of  imagination  with 
"  The  Raven"  and  "  Ulalume"  of  his  poetry. 

One  block  below  the  Square  we  find,  now 
surrendered  to  trade,  the  place  of  Poe's  last  city 
residence,  the  simple  yet  poetical  home  where 
Lowell  called  and  found  poor  Poe  "  not  himself 
that  day,"  and  where  Mrs.  Osgood  made  the 
pleasant  visits  she  described.  Here  at  "  his  desk 
beneath  the  romantic  picture  of  his  loved  and 
lost  Lenore"  he  penned,  among  other  composi 
tions,  that  chapter  of  accumulated  horrors,  "  The 
Facts  in  the  Case  of  M.  Valdemar," — which  has 
been  pronounced  one  of  the  best  examples  of 
fiction  having  the  semblance  of  literal  verity, — 
the  "  Philosophy  of  Composition,"  with  its 
much  discussed  genesis  of  "  The  Raven,"  and 
"The  Literati  of  New  York,"  which  incensed 
or  incensed  many  of  his  contemporary  authors. 
Around  the  corner  in  Green  Street  dwelt  the 
brilliant  Charles  Fenno  Hoffman,  editor  of  the 
Knickerbocker  ;  he  and  Poe  used  to  meet  at  the 
popular  literary  receptions  which  were  held  in 
61 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

the  house  of  the  divine,  Orville  Dewey,  upon 
the  next  block  of  Mercer  Street.  Both  blocks 
are  now  resigned  to  business,  and  the  edifice  of 
Dr.  Dewey's  church  in  the  adjacent  Broadway, 
where  Bryant  long  worshipped,  is  occupied  by 
an  athletic  club. 

While  living  in  University  Place  near  Wash 
ington  Square,  Bayard  Taylor  wrote  in  four  days 
his  dramatic  "  Masque  of  the  Gods,"  which  he 
considered  his  best  work  and  which  expressed 
the  results  of  years  of  study  of  the  problems  of 
divinity  and  philosophy.  Near  by,  in  Clinton 
Place,  the  substantial  dwelling  at  No.  20  where 
lived  and  died  Evert  Augustus  Duyckinck,  co 
author  of  the  "  Cyclopaedia  of  American  Litera 
ture,"  author  of  "  The  War  for  the  Union,"  etc., 
is  now  replaced  by  a  business  building  ;  the 
sometime  home  of  the  Century  Club  upon  the 
same  block  has  been  rebuilt,  and  a  once  poetic 
abode  of  Anne  Lynch  (Mrs.  Botta)  is  now  pro 
faned  by  a  bar-room.  An  old-fashioned  brick 
dwelling,  with  vines  growing  from  area  to  cor 
nice,  which  stands  nearer  to  Fifth  Avenue  in  the 
same  street,  is  the  charming  home  of  Richard 
Watson  Gilder,  who  has  here  written  much  of  his 
exquisite  verse,  including  some  of  the  later  poems 
of  heroic  themes  and  portions  of  his  "  Books 
of  Song,"  and  here  holds  the  brilliant  assem- 
62 


Home  of  Gilder — Botta — Tuckerman 

blages  which  are  events  of  the  best  literary  life 
of  the  metropolis.  A  little  beyond,  at  No.  84, 
the  residence  of  Judge  Daly,  Du  Chaillu  wrote 
most  of  the  thrilling  tale  of  "  Ivar  the  Viking" 
and  parts  of  two  other  books  not  yet  published. 
A  modern  brownstone  house  in  the  adjacent 
Ninth  Street  stands  upon  the  place  of  a  quon 
dam  famous  resort  of  Poe's  "  Literati,"  the 
home  of  Mrs.  Botta,  where  Thackeray  attended 
her  receptions  and  met  many  luminaries  of  let 
ters  and  art ;  almost  opposite,  in  the  three-storied 
house  then  numbered  36,  the  once  queenly  actress 
Mary  Ann  Dyke  Duff,  who  was  Tom  Moore's 
first  sweetheart  and  whose  wondrous  beauty  in 
spired  some  of  his  poems,  died  in  age  and  pov 
erty  at  the  home  of  her  daughter ;  upon  the 
same  block  was  the  modest  dwelling — "  two- 
storied  and  quite  convenient" — which  was  for 
some  time  the  abode  of  William  Cullen  Bryant, 
who  described  it  as  being  near  the  home  of 
Irving's  friend  Brevoort,  which  still  stands,  "  a 
kind  of  palace  in  a  garden,"  at  the  corner  of 
Fifth  Avenue. 

In  the  Studio  Building  in  Tenth  Street  we  may 
still  see  the  second-story  front  room  where  the 
graceful  and  scholarly  author  and  critic,  Henry 
T.  Tuckerman,  kept  his  library  and  wrote  some 
of  his  later  volumes,  including  "  The  Criterion," 
63 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

"Book  of  the  Artists,"  etc.  The  odd  little 
studio  of  Abbey  on  the  rear  of  the  lot  just 
across  the  street,  now  a  part  of  the  artistic  and 
tasteful  house  No.  58,  figures  in  Prof.  Mat- 
thews's  "  The  Last  Meeting,"  and  is  introduced 
by  Hopkinson  Smith  into  his  "  Colonel  Carter 
of  Cartersville  ;"  the  apartment  beneath,  at  pres 
ent  the  attractive  dining-room  of  the  dwelling, 
was  the  place  of  meeting  of  the  Tile  Club.  A 
block  northward  Kate  Douglas  Wiggin,  the 
author  of  "  Marm  Lisa,"  "  Polly  Oliver's  Prob 
lem,"  and  other  clever  stories,  had  for  some  time 
an  elegant  city  residence  on  the  same  street  where 
Howells  locates  the  offices  of  Every  Other  Week 
and  the  home  of  the  breezy  Fulkerson  and  his 
pretty  wife  in  "  A  Hazard  of  New  Fortunes," 
— Mrs.  Grosvenor  Green's  "  gimcrackery  apart 
ment"  in  the  Xenophon,  where  the  Marches 
lived,  being  not  far  away. 

In  Fourteenth  Street  near  Sixth  Avenue  a  shop 
long  ago  displaced  the  house  No.  58  where  the 
senior  Henry  James  resided  during  some  portion 
of  his  gifted  son's  boyhood  and  wrote  "  The 
Nature  of  Evil"  and  other  theological  works  ;  at 
No.  1 8,  east  of  Fifth  Avenue,  was  the  last  city 
domicile  of  Poe's  "  Sappho-like  songstress," 
Frances  Sargent  Osgood,  poet  of  "  Eurydice," 
"  Labor,"  "  The  Spirit  of  Poetry,"  etc.,  whose 
64 


Where  Bryant  Died 

passionate  love-lyrics  once  thrilled  all  hearts  and 
whose  salons  were  thronged  by  authors,  artists, 
and  others  of  kindred  pursuits.  Her  delightful 
home  has  given  place  to  a  store,  and  so,  also,  has 
the  quondam  abode  of  the  genial  godfather  of 
Flora  McFlimsy,  who  dwelt  next  door  to  the 
corner  of  University  Place  when  he  wrote  the 
popular  satirical  poem  "  Nothing  to  Wear." 
Here  Butler's  windows  overlooked  Union  Square, 
which  has  since  been  celebrated  by  the  muses  of 
Prof.  Matthews  and  Dr.  van  Dyke,  and  where 
sometime  played  the  little  boy  who  lived  to 
become  the  author  of  "  Trilby"  and  "  The 
Martian." 

West  of  the  Square  and  adjoining  the  college 
of  St.  Francis  Xavier  in  Sixteenth  Street  we 
find  the  dignified  brownstone  dwelling  which 
was  Bryant's  final  New  York  residence,  changed 
chiefly  by  the  removal  of  the  poet's  belongings 
since  his  body  was  borne  hence  to  its  burial. 
Here  we  may  see  the  spacious  parlors  where  he 
entertained  many  of  the  lights  of  letters  and 
where  was  presented  to  him  on  his  eightieth 
birthday  the  congratulatory  address  signed  by 
thousands  of  admirers  ;  the  library  above,  where 
much  of  his  literary  work  was  done,  where  at 
the  age  of  eighty-four  he  wrote  the  stanzas  on 
the  birthday  of  Washington, — a  manuscript  copy 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

of  which  lay  here  upon  his  table  when  General 
Wilson  assisted  him  up  the  stairs  after  the  fatal 
fall, — and  where,  a  fortnight  later,  the  mortal 
part  of  Stoddard's  "  Dead  Master"  lay  awaiting 
the  funeral ;  and  the  adjoining  sleeping-apart 
ment  of  the  poet,  where,  after  days  of  lingering 
on  the  shadowy  frontier,  his  spirit  crossed  as 
coma  deepened  into  death. 

A  literary  ramble  through  the  eastern  section 
of  this  rather  vague  "  Latin  Quarter"  will  reward 
us  beyond  expectation.  In  Third  Street  near 
Second  Avenue  we  may  still  find  the  neat  little 
house,  once  No.  46,  where  Richard  Henry  Stod- 
dard  lived  when  he  wrote  most  of  the  beautiful 
"  Songs  of  Summer"  and  "  The  Fisher  and 
Charon :"  to  him  here  came  nightly  such  guests 
as  Taylor  and  the  brilliant  O'Brien,  with  many 
major  and  minor  lights  of  contemporary  litera 
ture.  At  a  large  yellow  frame  house  whilom 
standing  just  out  of  the  Bowery  in  Fourth  Street 
Bryant  sometime  boarded,  and  entertained  Cath 
erine  Sedgwick  and  Anna  Jameson  ;  his  life-long 
friend  Dr.  Dewey  and  Parke  Godwin,  then 
a  "  briefless  barrister,"  were  Bryant's  fellow- 
boarders  in  this  house,  and  here  began  between 
Godwin  and  the  poet  the  acquaintance  which 
resulted  in  the  formation  of  close  family,  literary, 
66 


Bryant — Charlotte  Temple — Cooper 

and  business  associations.  The  near-by  La 
fayette  Place  holds  that  great  treasure-house  of 
letters,  the  Astor  Library,  of  which  Irving,  Hal- 
leek,  and  Bristed — the  latter  author  of  "  The 
Upper  Ten  Thousand,"  etc. — were  trustees, 
and  which  stands  on  a  portion  of  the  site  of 
Vauxhall  Garden  Theatre,  where  the  parents  of 
Poe  played  before  his  birth  and  his  pretty 
mother  sang  her  favorite  lay,  "  When  Edward 
Left  his  Native  Plain."  Around  the  next  cor 
ner,  in  what  was  once  Art  Street,  aforetime 
stood  the  old  stone  house  which  was  the  home 
of  poor  "  Charlotte  Temple,"  and  upon  the  op 
posite  block  stands  the  Bible  House,  where  in 
room  No.  43  (now  76)  Horace  Greeley  concealed 
himself  from  his  friends  while  writing  "  The 
American  Conflict"  and  other  works.  A  three- 
storied  red-brick  house  with  arched  doorway 
and  ornate  trimmings  standing  in  St.  Mark's 
Place  just  out  of  Third  Avenue  was  for  two  or 
three  winters  the  abode  of  James  Fenimore 
Cooper,  who  here  wrote  most  of  that  satirical 
tale  "  The  Monikins"  and  gallantly  waged  war 
against  his  critics  and  detractors. 

This  is  the  neighborhood  of  the  old  Bowery 

hamlet  which  grew  up  about  the  chapel  which 

the  once  puissant  Peter  Stuyvesant  erected  upon 

his    farm   after    his    enforced    retirement    from 

67 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

public  life  :  the  place  of  his  dwelling  near 
Second  Avenue  is  now  overbuilt  by  a  solid  pile 
of  buildings,  and  the  site  of  the  chapel  is  occu 
pied  by  St.  Mark's  Church,  beneath  whose  wails 
repose  the  ashes  of  Diedrich  Knickerbocker's 
sturdy  hero,  that  historian  being  himself  interred, 
according  to  the  introduction  to  his  veracious 
chronicle,  in  the  adjoining  churchyard.  A  little 
way  eastward  once  stood  a  quaint,  gambrel- 
roofed  mansion  with  wide  verandas  along  its 
front  and  tree-studded  lawns  all  about  it,  which 
was  long  the  home  of  Mrs.  Peter  G.  Stuyvesant, 
— wife  of  a  descendant  of  the  doughty  governor, 
— who  made  it  the  beloved  resort  of  many  of 
the  wits  and  litterateurs  of  the  time,  among 
them  being  Drake  and  Halleck,  who  once  found 
the  hostess  in  tears  because  First  Avenue  was  to 
be  opened  through  her  garden.  Upon  another 
portion  of  the  estate,  nearer  the  East  River, 
Irving's  Knickerbocker  passed  his  last  days 
among  the  salt  grasses  and  mosquitoes. 

Much  of  the  period  of  Walt  Whitman's  later 
visits  to  his  "  mast-hemmed  Manhattan"  was 
spent  in  a  three-storied  brick  house  in  Tenth 
Street  east  of  Third  Avenue,  then  the  home  of 
his  friend  John  H.  Johnston,  and  residents  of 
the  locality  still  remember  him  as  they  saw  him 
limping  upon  the  pavement  or  sitting  at  his 
68 


Whitman — Grant  White — Patti 

window  looking  like  a  Greek  god ;  almost  op 
posite,  in  the  cozy  little  dwelling  now  No.  118, 
Richard  Grant  White  lived  for  many  years, 
having  Stedman  for  a  "  next-door-but-one  neigh 
bor"  a  part  of  the  time,  and  here  wrote  the 
trenchant  "  New  Gospel  of  Peace"  and  most  of 
his  Shakespearian  and  philological  treatises. 
Nearer  Third  Avenue  we  find  the  shabby  little 
brick  house  in  which  Adelina  Patti  lived  as  a 
child  and  began  her  wonderful  musical  career  : 
some  who  saw  her  here  still  speak  of  the 
roguish,  dark-eyed  child  who  played  with  her 
doll  upon  the  steps  and  danced  in  the  doorway 
with  her  sister  or  Leontine  Maretzek  to  the 
music  of  a  passing  barrel-organ  or  peripatetic 
band. 

At  the  nearest  corner  of  Broadway  stands  the 
fashionable  fane — loved  and  sung  of  the  mad 
poet  Clarke — whose  spire  "  thrilling  heaven 
ward  like  a  hymn"  the  hero  of  Howells's 
"  World  of  Chance"  noted  as  he  walked  up 
Broadway  with  the  manuscript  of  one  novel 
under  his  arm  and  the  plot  of  another  in  his 
brain.  The  westering  sun  casts  the  shadow  of 
that  beautiful  spire  almost  athwart  the  yellow- 
painted  brick  edifice  at  the  corner  of  Fourth 
Avenue  and  Tenth  Street  which  long  contained 
the  home  of  Stoddard  and  his  gifted  wife.  The 
69 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

duration  of  their  residence  here  constituted  for 
both  the  period  of  greatest  literary  activity,  each 
producing  more  than  in  any  other  twelve  years  : 
during  this  time  the  lady  wrote  "  Temple 
House,"  "  The  Morgesons,"  and  other  tales, 
and  much  of  the  verse  of  her  latest  volume. 
Here  Stoddard  composed  numerous  poems,  in 
cluding  the  massive  Horatian  Ode  on  Lincoln 
and  the  graceful  and  limpid  narrative  of  "  The 
King's  Bell  ;"  here  the  sorrow  of  his  life  came 
to  him  in  the  loss  of  his  angelic  boy  whose  life 
and  death  are  celebrated  in  Bayard  Taylor's 
"  Euphorion."  To  this  sorrow  we  are  indebted 
for  the  exquisitely  touching  poems  of  "  In  Me- 
moriam"  which  were  produced  by  Stoddard  in 
the  months  succeeding  the  child's  death  "  at 
half-past  six."  It  was  to  this  home  that  Sted- 
man — the  "  Poet,  Scholar,  Gentleman"  to  whom 
Stoddard's  "  Melodies  and  Madrigals,"  written 
here,  was  dedicated — introduced  Howells  ;  here 
the  latter  made  the  early  visits  which  he  has 
pleasantly  pictured  ;  hither  came  scores  of 
authors,  journalists,  and  other  "devotees  of 
genius,"  as  one  of  the  circle  styled  them,  and 
here  Stedman  wrote  "  The  Blameless  Prince." 
A  neat  dwelling,  then  No.  181  Thirteenth 
Street,  was  sometime  occupied  jointly  by  the 
friends  Stoddard  and  Taylor,  the  latter  paying 
70 


Home  of  R.  H.  Stoddard 

the  rent  because,  as  he  said,  "  he  was  most 
prosperous  ;"  here  Stoddard  wrote  "  Loves  and 
Heroines  of  the  Poets,"  and  the  "  Life  of  Hum- 
boldt,"  for  which  Taylor  wrote  an  introduction. 
For  a  quarter  of  a  century  the  Stoddards, 
white  haired  now,  have  had  their  home  in  a 
pleasant  three-storied  house  with  a  piazza  across 
its  front,  in  Fifteenth  Street  a  little  east  of  Stuy- 
vesant  Square.  Here  we  find  the  tender-hearted 
bard  still  holding  faith  in  the  highest  ideals  of 
his  art  and  still  devoted  to  the  life-work  for 
which  he  "  has  yielded  the  light  of  his  eyes, 
the  strength  of  his  right  hand."  His  home, 
like  his  mind,  is  a  veritable  treasury  of  literary 
reminiscences ;  its  walls  are  lined  with  portraits 
and  paintings, — among  the  latter  being  Richard's 
"  Castle  in  the  Air,"  which  was  suggested  by 
Stoddard's  poem  of  that  title ;  its  rooms  are 
filled  with  precious  bric-a-brac  and  curios,  rare 
books,  priceless  manuscripts  of  famous  authors, 
autograph  letters  and  volumes,  and  numerous 
other  souvenirs  of  his  protracted  friendships 
among  the  brightest  intellects  of  his  day.  Sur 
rounded  by  his  treasures,  we  find  the  venerated 
minstrel  in  his  second  story  study  seated  at  his 
desk  between  the  front  windows,  with  the  por 
trait  of  Thackeray  looking  benignantly  down 
upon  him  from  the  wall,  and  here  he  has  done 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

the  most  and  some  of  the  best  of  his  editorial  and 
critical  work,  and  has  written  much  of  that 
virile  yet  elegant  and  tender  verse  for  which  the 
world  will  long  love  him.  Latterly  the  poet 
finds  greater  pleasure  in  the  dramaturgic  suc 
cesses  of  his  son,  the  "  Lori"  of  his  poems, 
than  in  his  own  triumphs  and  honors. 

In  the  brownstone  house  No.  224  Fourteenth 
Street,  east  of  Third  Avenue,  Du  Chailiu  wrote 
his  graphic  account  of  "  The  Land  of  the  Mid 
night  Sun."  Below  Fifteenth  Street  in  Irving 
Place  stands  a  plain  old  mansion  which  was  the 
early  home  of  the  Lotos  Club  :  the  spacious  old 
rooms,  at  first  furnished  with  camp-stools  and 
empty  boxes,  deserve  more  than  the  passing 
notice  we  may  accord  to  them,  for  they  have 
witnessed  brilliant  assemblages  and  heard  the 
brightest  discourse  when  Saxe,  Collins,  Yates, 
Tupper,  Fields,  Stoddard,  Lord  Houghton, 
Froude,  Colonel  Hay,  Charles  Kingsley,  Bret 
Harte,  Joaquin  Miller,  and  others  like  them 
were  here  entertained.  A  modest  brick  house 
upon  the  next  block  of  Irving  Place  is  the  city 
home  of  the  family  of  the  late  E.  P.  Roe,  who 
preserve  here  many  of  his  books  and  other 
belongings,  including  his  old-fashioned  walnut 
writing-table  and  the  revolving  chair  in  which 
he  sat  to  pen  "  Barriers  Burned  Away"  and  his 
72 


Lotos  Club — Century — Gilder 

other  popular  tales.  Around  the  corner  in  Fif 
teenth  Street,  occupied  now  by  a  brewers'  asso 
ciation,  we  find  the  edifice  which  was  the  his 
toric  abode  of  the  Century  Club  in  the  years 
when  it  had  for  its  presidents  such  authors  as 
Verplanck,  Bancroft,  and  Bryant,  and  received 
such  guests  as  Wilkie  Collins,  Charles  Kingsley, 
Lord  Houghton,  Matthew  Arnold,  Huxley, 
Froude,  and  Thackeray ;  it  was  in  these  rooms 
that  the  latter  declared  he  "  felt  more  at  home 
than  elsewhere  in  America,"  and  here  was  held 
the  memorable  celebration  of  the  seventieth 
birthday  of  Bryant,  whose  poetic  renown  was 
one  of  the  most  precious  possessions  of  the  club. 
A  few  steps  nearer  Union  Square  is  the  uniquely 
picturesque  dwelling  which  Gilder,  the  poet  of 
"  The  Celestial  Passion,"  fitted  up  for  his  home, 
and  where,  during  the  years  of  his  occupancy, 
were  held  the  many  scintillant  assemblies  at 
which  the  cream  of  the  literary  and  artistic  cir 
cles  of  the  city  could  be  found;  here  the  Au 
thors  Club  held  its  initial  session,  and  here  the 
poet  Charles  de  Kay,  the  originator  of  the 
Club,  later  lived  for  several  years  and  wrote  his 
life  of  Barye,  the  sculptor,  and  many  essays  and 
sketches. 

In  pleasant  rooms  upon  the  fifth  floor  of  the 
Westminster,  in  the  next  street  northward,  our 
73 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

foremost  apostle  and  exponent  of  realism  in  the 
art  of  fiction,  William  Dean  Howells,  lived  last 
year  until  his  departure  for  Europe,  and  here,  in 
his  sixtieth  year,  wrote  the  "  Ohio  Stories"  and 
prepared  for  the  press  that  vivid  and  impressively 
realistic  tale  "  The  Landlord  at  Lion's  Head." 
By  Stuyvesant  Square,  at  No.  330  East  Seven 
teenth  Street,  is  the  apartment-house  which  has 
erstwhile  been  the  abode  of  Howells,  White, 
Matthews,  and  the  poet  and  humorist  H.  C. 
Bunner ;  here  the  latter  wrote  most  of  "  Airs 
of  Arcady"  and,  in  collaboration  with  Matthews, 
the  stories  of  "  In  Partnership,"  and  Matthews 
produced  his  "  French  Dramatists  of  the  Nine 
teenth  Century."  In  this  house  Howells  began 
"  A  Hazard  of  New  Fortunes,"  and  here  he 
suffered  the  bereavement  which  changed  and 
darkened  his  life  in  the  untimely  death  of  his 
poet  daughter,  the  "  child  of  exquisite  ideals" 
who  was  born  in  the  Giustiniani  palace  during 
his  Venetian  life.  Above  a  bookstore  at  No.  5 
of  the  same  street  Bunner  earlier  had  bachelor 
apartments  and  wrote  "  The  Midge"  and  some 
songs  of  his  "Airs  of  Arcady."  In  chambers 
here  also  lived  Robert  Bridges  ("  Droch")  at  the 
time  he  produced  "  Overheard  in  Arcady,"  and 
here  now  resides  Poe's  latest  and  best  biographer, 
Prof.  George  E.  Woodberry. 
74 


Howells — Taylor — Matthews 

Bayard  Taylor's  last  home  in  America  was  in 
the  Stuyvesant  Building  in  the  next,  Eighteenth, 
street ;  his  were  the  apartments  on  the  ground- 
floor  at  the  right  of  the  entrance,  the  first  room 
of  the  suite  being  his  literary  workshop,  where 
— worn  with  work  and  worry  and,  as  he  said, 
"  living  from  day  to  day  on  the  verge  of  physical 
prostration" — he  translated  Schiller's  "  Don 
Carlos"  and  wrote  several  minor  pieces  like 
"  Peach  Blossoms"  and  his  last  poem,  the  elegy 
on  Bryant ;  here  he  composed  most  of  the 
lyrical  drama  "  Prince  Deukalion,"  which 
proved  to  be  his  "  swan-song," — a  single  printed 
copy  of  it  being  placed  in  his  hands  not  many 
days  before  his  death ;  from  this  house  he  set 
out  upon  the  mission  which  was  to  terminate  so 
sadly  and  soon,  and  to  it  returned  his  widow  to 
dwell  a  few  years  later.  The  sober  brownstone 
mansion  at  No.  121  of  this  street  was  for  sixteen 
years  the  abode  of  Prof.  Brander  Matthews, 
who  here  wrote  "  His  Father's  Son,"  "  Vign 
ettes  of  Manhattan,''  "  Aspects  of  Fiction," 
and  other  widely  read  books  •  he  laid  the  scene 
of  "  The  Last  Meeting"  in  his  library  here, 
transferring  to  it  for  the  purposes  of  the  story, 
as  he  says,  Laurence  Hutton's  famous  collection 
of  death-masks,  and  making  Mr.  Hutton  figure 
as  the  "  Uncle  Larry  Laughton"  of  the  novelette. 
75 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Here  were  held  the  earliest  sessions  of  the 
Copyright  League  and  of  the  Dunlap  Society 
for  the  publication  of  literature  concerning  the 
American  stage,  and  in  the  Florence,  at  the 
near-by  corner  of  Fourth  Avenue,  Matthews 
gave  the  dinner  which  launched  the  Kinsmen,  a 
social  club  whose  membership  is  made  up  from 
the  kindred  professions  of  letters  and  art.  In 
delightful  apartments  of  the  Florence  the  widow 
of  the  once  famous  romancer  Herman  Melville 
resides  with  her  daughter,  and  in  the  same  edifice 
is  the  city  residence  of  Edgar  Saltus,  where  he  is 
engaged  upon  his  extensive  compilation  of  litera 
ture  and  upon  other  literary  tasks.  At  No.  35 
of  the  adjacent  Nineteenth  Street  we  find  the 
three-storied  painted- brick  house,  now  devoted 
to  business  and  defaced  with  signboards,  which 
was  long  the  home  of  Horace  Greeley,  where 
many  of  the  literati  were  entertained  and  much 
literary  work  was  done ;  here  Phoebe  Gary, 
while  awaiting  breakfast  one  Sabbath  morning, 
wrote  the  beautiful  song  beginning  with  the  line 
"  One  sweetly  solemn  thought."  Next  door 
lived  Butler  when  he  produced  "  Barnum's  Par 
nassus,"  and  at  No.  53  of  the  next  block  in 
Twentieth  Street  the  sisters  Gary  dwelt  many 
years  and  wrought  the  sweetness  and  purity  of 
their  natures  into  song  and  story.  Their  unpre- 
76 


Alice  Gary — Mrs.  Burton  Harrison 

tentious  little  brick  dwelling  has  been  but 
slightly  changed  since  it  passed  to  strangers,  and 
we  may  still  see  the  pretty,  bay-windowed  par 
lor  on  the  right,  where  for  fifteen  years  were 
held  the  delightful  Sunday  night  receptions 
which  drew  such  spirits  as  Stoddard,  Taylor, 
Whittier,  Ripley,  Aldrich,  Whipple,  Parton, 
Greeley,  Fields,  Ole  Bull,  Justin  McCarthy, 
and  others  of  similar  gifts,  Phoebe's  study  above 
the  parlor,  and  the  room  at  the  left  of  the 
passage  where  Alice  wrote  her  best  books  and 
carolled  the  songs  for  which  she  is  remembered 
and  loved ;  here  her  "  Born  Thrall"  was  begun, 
and  here  she  breathed  out  her  life,  relinquishing 
her  work  only  when,  in  the  weariness  of  death, 
the  pen  literally  fell  from  her  hand. 

In  the  picturesque  church  of  All  Souls  at  the 
next  corner  the  coffined  form  of  Bryant  lay  in 
the  sublime  majesty  of  death  while  Dr.  Bellows 
pronounced  above  it  his  eloquent  funeral  dis 
course  to  a  thronging  assemblage  of  mourners 
famed  in  letters,  art,  and  politics.  Eastward 
from  the  church  we  find  at  83  Irving  Place  the 
ample  red-brick  mansion  which  was  the  home 
of  Mrs.  Burton  Harrison  when  she  wrote 
"  Anglomaniacs,"  "  Sweet  Bells  out  of  Tune," 
and  other  clever  and  piquant  books  ;  in  a  smaller 
dwelling  which  formerly  stood  a  little  above  the 
77 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

adjacent  Gramercy  Park  she  resided  at  the  period 
when  "  Helen  Troy,"  "  Bric-a-Brac  Tales,"  and 
similar  stories  and  sketches  first  won  her  enviable 
reputation.  Dr.  Griswold,  the  writer  of  the 
"  Poets  and  Poetry  of  America,"  whom  Stod- 
dard  once  described  as  "  the  chief  herdsman  of 
our  Parnassian  fold,"  dwelt  at  the  time  he  edited 
the  International  in  a  now  old  brick  building 
which  stands  on  Twentieth  Street  near  Second 
Avenue,  and  here  received  many  of  the  literary 
men  and  women  of  that  day.  With  a  dignified 
old  mansion  in  the  next  street  Washington  Ir 
ving  was  more  closely  associated  than  with  any 
other  house  now  remaining  on  Manhattan ;  it  is 
now  No.  39  East  Twenty-first  Street, — a  brown- 
stone,  high-stooped  structure  of  four  stories, 
little  changed  exteriorly,  save  that  an  iron  bal 
cony  has  been  removed  from  beneath  the  draw 
ing-room  windows  since  the  time  the  illustrious 
author  tarried  beneath  its  roof.  Tt  was  then  the 
residence  of  his  nephew,  John  T.  Irving,  and 
the  habitual  sojourn  of  the  gifted  uncle  during 
his  protracted  visits  to  the  city  ;  at  this  house 
were  written  some  of  his  published  letters,  and 
here  in  the  front  room  of  the  third  story  he 
composed  a  portion  of  the  "  Life  of  Mahomet" 
and  chapters  of  other  books.  The  more  stately 
Bradish  Johnson  mansion,  which  stood  a  block 
78 


Griswold — Irving — Lotos  Club 

westward  on  the  same  street  and  has  been  re 
placed  by  a  bookstore,  was  the  first  Fifth  Avenue 
home  of  the  Lotos  Club,  where  Farjeon,  Sala, 
Stedman,  Warner,  Dr.  Holmes,  Bayard  Taylor, 
Edwin  Arnold,  and  Marion  Crawford  were 
among  its  honored  guests. 


79 


IV 

NORTHWARD    TO  THE    HAR 
LEM,   AND   BEYOND 

Grisivold—Eggleston—De  Kay-Authors  Club-Faivcett-Mitch- 
ell—Hutton— Century  Club— Lotos— Mrs.  Wihox—Stedman— 
Wiggin—Hoivells—Poe  —  Mahan—Audubon  —  Mrs.  JBarr— 
Brooks—  Melville  —  Davis  —  Allen— Hopkinson  Smith  -  Hol 
land  -  Van  Dyke  -  Wilson  -  Margaret  Fuller  -  Irving  - 
Drake's  Grave,  etc. 

/t  BOVE  the  neighborhood  of  Union  Square 
•*"*•  the  shrines  we  seek  rapidly  diminish  in 
frequency,  and  the  walks  between  them  corre 
spondingly  lengthen  as  newer  portions  of  the  city 
are  traversed.  Sauntering  through  the  region 
lying  west  of  the  Fifth  Avenue  of  George 
Arnold's  dolorous  threnode,  "  Facilis  Descensus 
Avenue,"  we  find  at  No.  17  West  Twenty-first 
Street  the  handsome  brownstone  mansion  which 
was  for  some  years  the  abode  of  Bancroft,  who 
here  produced  some  volumes  of  his  great  his 
torical  work  in  a  large  back  room  of  the  second 
story.  Away  towards  the  Hudson  stands,  at 
No.  436  of  the  next  street,  the  artistic  dwelling 
which  once  was  the  home  of  Edwin  Forrest  and 
the  resort  of  such  spirits  as  Willis,  Bryant,  Clark, 
and  Hoffman ;  in  the  hands  of  sympathetic 
strangers  the  spiral  stairs  and  other  peculiar  fea- 
80 


Bancroft — Griswold — Eggleston 

tures  of  the  house  have  been  preserved,  and  its 
rooms  are  now  filled  with  curios  and  costly  works 
of  art.  Nearer  Tenth  Avenue,  on  the  same 
street,  Patti  dwelt,  a  maiden  of  twelve,  with 
her  sister  Amalia  Strakosch  ;  and  not  far  away, 
in  the  midst  of  grounds  which  extended  to  the 
river,  once  lived  Prof.  Clement  C.  Moore,  and 
wrote  scholarly  volumes  which  are  now  little 
regarded,  while  a  simple  rhyme,  composed  in  an 
idle  hour  for  his  children, — "'Twas  the  night 
before  Christmas," — has  apparently  immortal 
ized  his  name. 

Long  ago  a  shop  displaced  the  comfortable 
brick  house  with  curved  front  which  Dr.  Gris 
wold  inhabited  at  22  West  Twenty-third  Street, 
where  he  wrote  "  The  Republican  Court"  and 
maintained  a  sort  of  literary  court  for  the  younger 
authors  of  the  day.  A  suite  of  rooms  in  the 
mammoth  Chelsea,  in  the  same  street  west  of 
Seventh  Avenue,  was  for  some  time  the  winter 
home  of  the  author  of  "  The  Hoosier  School 
master,"  Dr.  Eggleston,  who  here  wrote  his 
valuable  school  histories,  completed  the  satirical 
"  Faith  Doctor,"  and  commenced  another  novel 
not  yet  finished.  In  the  Chelsea,  too,  Dr.  Hep- 
worth  and  "Jenny  June"  Croly  have  lived  for 
several  years,  and  here  the  latter  accomplished 
most  of  her  work  on  the  history  of  the  Woman's 
6  81 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

Club  movement.  A  picturesque  row  standing 
well  back  from  Twenty-third  Street  just  west 
of  Ninth  Avenue  holds  the  present  home  of  the 
versatile  Charles  de  Kay,  who  completed  here  his 
new  work  on  "  Bird-Gods,"  an  exhaustive  study 
of  some  phases  of  the  earlier  European  religions. 
At  No.  19  of  the  next,  Twenty-fourth,  street,  the 
Authors  Club  had  for  some  years  pleasant  rooms 
in  a  building  which  is  now  devoted  to  business 
purposes,  and  here  entertained  such  guests  as 
Lowell,  Whittier,  Field,  Gosse,  and  Matthew 
Arnold.  At  No.  26  West  Twenty-seventh 
Street  lived  the  imaginative  Edgar  Fawcett,  poet 
of  "  Romance  and  Revery"  and  author  of  many 
spirited  tales  and  sketches,  when  he  wrote  the 
clever  "  Mild  Barbarian,"  etc.  ;  and  at  the  Hol 
land  House,  a  little  above,  the  vivacious  John 
Kendrick  Bangs  wrote  "  Mr.  Bonaparte  of 
Corsica."  Robert  Bridges  has  apartments  in  the 
Life  building  in  Thirty-first  Street  west  of  Fifth 
Avenue,  where  he  wrote  his  "  Suppressed  Chap 
ters  ;"  here  Albert  M.  Bagby  produced  the 
musical  novel  "  Miss  Traumerei  ;"  and  in  his 
offices  in  the  same  edifice  John  A.  Mitchell 
worked  upon  his  books  "  Amos  Judd"  and 
"  Gloria  Victis."  The  substantial  three-storied 
red  brick  house  No.  229  West  Thirty-fourth 
Street  was  long  inhabited  by  Laurence  Hutton, 
82 


De  Kay — Fawcett — Hutton 

who  here  gathered  a  wealth  of  literary  and 
artistic  treasures  which  covered  the  walls  and 
crowded  the  rooms  of  his  delightful  home, — 
beautiful  paintings,  rare  articles  of  virtu>  signed 
portraits,  manuscript  books  and  letters, — me 
mentos,  most  of  them,  of  Mr.  Hutton's  friends 
among  the  literators  and  artists  of  the  day,  many 
of  whom  have  been  for  weeks  at  a  time  associ 
ated  with  this  house  as  familiar  guests.  The 
number  includes  Julian  Hawthorne,  Warner, 
Clemens,  Aldrich,  Bunner,  and  others  who  have 
here  done  much  good  literary  work.  Here  a 
large  portion  of  Fiske's  "  Myths  and  Myth- 
Makers"  was  written,  and  here  the  "  Beatrix 
Randolph"  of  Julian  Hawthorne's  story  lived, 
acted,  and  was  acted  upon.  The  Authors  Club 
and  the  Copyright  League  were  formally  insti 
tuted  at  meetings  held  in  this  house,  Mr.  Hutton 
being  elected  an  officer  of  each  organization. 
Above  the  entrance  door  was  his  study,  its  walls 
lined  with  the  wonderful  collection  of  death- 
masks,  where  Mr.  Hutton  has  written  nearly 
all  his  books,  including  the  series  of  "  Literary 
Landmarks"  which  has  made  him  known  to 
readers  round  the  world.  Only  a  few  months  ago 
he  removed  from  these  memory-haunted  rooms, 
following  the  famous  masks  to  Princeton,  where 
he  has  donated  them  to  the  University. 
83 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

In  a  quiet  rear  room  of  the  Marlborough  at 
Thirty-sixth  Street  and  Broadway,  his  windows 
overlooking  a  near  church-roof,  Du  Chaillu  was 
recently  engaged  upon  his  forthcoming  book, 
"  The  Land  of  the  Long  Night." 

In  Thirty-seventh  Street  west  of  Fifth  Avenue 
lately  stood  the  brownstone  dwelling  which  was 
the  home  of  the  graceful  poet  Anne  Lynch, — 
Mrs.  Botta, — whose  parlors  were  during  four 
decades  opened  regularly  for  brilliant  receptions 
to  the  kindred  guilds  of  letters  and  art,  at  which 
were  welcomed  many  most  illustrious  in  those 
pursuits  in  Europe  and  America ;  here  the  most 
of  her  "  Handbook  of  Universal  Literature"  was 
compiled.  The  palatial  edifice  No.  7  West 
Forty-third  Street  has  been  since  1891  the  abode 
of  the  Century  Club,  of  which  Bryant,  who 
died  its  honored  president,  was  chief  founder 
and  leading  spirit.  A  sumptuous  family  hotel  in 
the  next  street  has  been  for  the  past  two  years 
the  winter  home  of  the  poet  Ella  Wheeler 
Wilcox,  who  has  here  written  most  of  her  latest, 
longest,  and  brightest  poem,  "  Three  Women," 
which  she  regards  as  the  most  important  work 
of  her  life.  The  present  habitation  of  the  Lotos 
Club  is  a  handsome  brownstone  building  in  Fifth 
Avenue  below  Forty-sixth  Street,  where  eminent 
visitors  like  Warner,  Stedman,  Gilder,  Howells, 
84 


Century  Club — Lotos — Authors 

Clemens,  Dean  Hole,  Conan  Doyle,  "  Anthony 
Hope"  Hawkins,  etc.,  have  sat  at  the  guests' 
table.  An  ample,  ivy-mantled  mansion  of  brick 
in  Fifty-first  Street  just  out  of  Fifth  Avenue  is 
the  New  York  residence  of  that  bestower  of 
libraries,  the  author  of  "  Triumphant  Democ 
racy,"  etc.,  Andrew  Carnegie.  Edmund  C.  Sted- 
man,  during  some  of  his  most  prosperous  and 
productive  years,  occupied  the  brownstone  house 
71  West  Fifty-fourth  Street,  and  made  it  a  centre 
and  focus  of  lettered  culture  and  refinement :  a 
large  room  just  under  the  roof  and  remote  from 
ordinary  distracting  influences  was  the  workshop 
whence  he  gave  out  some  of  his  best  work  in 
poetry  and  criticism,  including  "  Poets  of  Amer 
ica."  Upon  an  upper  floor  of  the  Carnegie 
Building,  at  Fifty-seventh  Street  and  Seventh 
Avenue,  the  Authors  Club — organized  by  de 
Kay,  Gilder,  Brooks,  Stedman,  Eggleston,  Hut- 
ton,  and  Matthews,  and  now  embracing  many 
of  the  most  noted  authors  and  journalists  of 
Manhattan  and  its  dependencies — has  a  pleasant 
suite  of  rooms,  where  it  holds  its  delightfully 
informal  gatherings  and  entertains  literary  lions. 
At  the  next  corner,  Fifty-eighth  Street,  Mary 
Mapes  Dodge  resides  in  a  large  apartment-house. 
The  St.  Albans,  in  the  same  thoroughfare,  was 
for  six  years  the  city  home  of  Mrs.  Wilcox, 
85 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

who  here  wrote  "  Poems  of  Pleasure,"  "  How 
Salvator  Won,"  "  Men,  Women,  and  Emo 
tions,"  and  poems  and  sketches  for  other  vol 
umes. 

A  beautiful  suite  in  an  apartment-house  of  the 
next,  Fifty-ninth,  street  is  the  present  home  of 
the  bright  and  sprightly  Kate  Douglas  Wiggin, 
and  here  she  prepared  for  the  press  her  charm 
ing  story  of  "  Penelope's  Progress."  This  por 
tion  of  Fifty-ninth  Street  which  faces  the  Park 
is  little  changed  since  the  "  Altrurian  Traveller" 
described  it.  Save  that  one  or  two  vacant  lots 
have  since  been  overbuilt,  the  street  retains  the 
incongruous  succession  of  board  fences,  low- 
roofed  saloons,  lofty  apartment-houses,  and 
hotels,  and  presents  the  same  "  delirium  of  lines 
and  colors,  the  savage  anarchy  of  shapes,"  which 
Howells  depicted ;  and  one  apartment-house 
which  "  surges  skyward  nearly  fifty  feet  higher 
than  its  neighbors"  holds  now,  as  it  did  then,  the 
home  of  that  foremost  American  writer  of  the 
time.  In  "  comfortable  and  ornamental  cells" 
upon  the  fourth  floor  of  this  hive  he  dwelt  for 
some  years,  his  study  being  the  spacious  front 
room  with  windows  overlooking  the  Central 
Park,  which  Prof.  Matthews  makes  the  scene  of 
a  "  Vignette,"  and  of  whose  foliage,  paths,  and 
places  of  pleasance  Howells  himself  gives  us  de- 
86 


Wiggin — Howells's  Home — Fawcett 

lightful  "  Glimpses'*  in  pages  which  were  written 
here  with  the  beauties  of  the  Park  in  full  view. 
Here,  too,  he  wrote  famous  books,  among  them 
"The  Coast  of  Bohemia,"  "  A  Pair  of  Patient 
Lovers,"  "A  Traveller  from  Altruria,"  and 
most  of  "  The  Landlord  of  Lion's  Head"  and 
of  the  beautiful  but  despairing  poems  of  "  Stops 
of  Various  Quills."  To  a  lower  floor  of  this 
same  house  he  returned  from  his  latest  European 
sojourn,  and  now,  to  avoid  the  noise  of  the 
street  and  the  charm  of  the  beautiful  prospect 
from  the  front  windows,  which  might  allure  him 
from  his  tasks,  he  has  established  his  study  in  a 
quiet  back  room  of  the  apartment.  Here  are  a 
few  cases  of  much-used  books  and  a  typewriter, 
and  here,  in  front  of  a  window  which  looks  into 
the  silent  court,  Howells  works  for  some  hours 
of  each  morning ;  lately  he  was  engaged  upon  a 
then  unnamed  novel  of  American  travel  abroad, 
the  materials  for  which  he  had  collected  during 
his  recent  tour. 

The  second  flat  of  the  brownstone  house  No. 
14  West  Sixty-fifth  Street,  near  the  Park,  was 
the  latest  American  abode  of  Edgar  Fawcett, 
who  here  wrote  "  Life's  Fitful  Fever,"  "  Two 
Daughters  of  One  Race,"  and  the  charming 
"  Romance  of  Old  New  York."  Dr.  Eggleston 
spent  recent  winters  in  a  great  hotel  which  faces 
87 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

this  side  of  the  Park  a  little  farther  north,  where 
he  completed  "  The  Beginners  of  a  Nation'* 
and  has  since  worked  upon  another  volume  of 
his  "  History  of  Life  in  the  United  States." 
The  artistic  stone  house  No.  137  Seventy-eighth 
Street,  near  Columbus  Avenue,  was  Mr.  Sted- 
man's  home  before  he  removed  to  Bronxville : 
it  was  here  he  wrote  the  "  Nature  and  Elements 
of  Poetry"  and  edited  the  "  Victorian  An 
thology." 

Near  the  Boulevard,  upon  the  site  of  the 
house  No.  206  Eighty-fourth  Street  and  the  lot 
adjoining  on  the  east,  stood  until  a  few  years  ago 
a  large  old-fashioned  frame  dwelling  in  which 
Poe  wrote  that  tale  of  conscience  "  The  Imp  of 
the  Perverse."  Here,  too,  according  to  metro 
politan  belief,  he  composed  the  deathless  poem 
which  gave  him  his  highest  renown.  It  is  note 
worthy  that  while  several  localities  are  now 
claiming  the  honor  of  having  been  Poe's  home 
when  he  wrote  "  The  Raven,"  Dr.  Woods  is 
producing  specious  reasons  for  his  belief  that 
Poe  did  not  write  it  at  all.  The  house  stood 
high  upon  the  rocks  in  the  midst  of  a  pleasing 
rural  landscape,  and  was  occupied  by  the  parents 
of  Commissioner  Brennan,  with  whom  the  poet 
and  his  family  boarded :  his  room  was  a  large 
square  apartment  of  the  second  floor,  whose 
88 


Eggleston — Poe — Mahan 

front  windows  looked  across  the  lordly  Hudson 
to  the  heights  of  the  Palisades,  and  here  his  desk 
was  so  placed  that  his  eyes  rested  upon  that  in 
spiring  view  whenever  he  lifted  them  from  his 
page.  This  chamber  was  thereafter  called  the 
"  Raven  room,"  and  the  belief  of  the  Brennans 
and  their  neighbors  that  the  great  poem  was 
here  composed  is  alleged  to  have  been  founded 
upon  the  statements  of  Poe  and  Mrs.  Clemm,  as 
well  as  upon  the  exhibition  of  the  manuscript  in 
the  hands  of  the  poet.  A  decaying  scion  of  the 
tree  beneath  which  Poe  had  a  rustic  seat  still 
stands  upon  the  rocks  by  the  house-site,  and  one 
who  knew  him  here  points  out  the  place  of  the 
pond,  near  the  present  Boulevard,  which  was 
Poe's  habitual  resort,  and  the  rounded  summit 
of  rock  at  the  foot  of  Eighty-third  Street,  where 
he  often  sat  at  sunset  gazing  listlessly  upon  the 
moving  tides  of  the  river. 

Captain  Alfred  T.  Mahan,  the  author  who  is 
now  so  generally  recognized  as  an  authority  in 
naval  matters  and  whose  works  on  "  Sea  Power'* 
and  allied  subjects  have  lately  been  so  widely 
read,  resides  in  a  handsome  brick  house  of  co 
lonial  design,  with  pretty  bay  windows  and 
trimmings  of  light  stone,  which  stands  in 
Eighty-sixth  Street  east  of  Amsterdam  Avenue. 
Years  ago  Prof.  Matthews  laid  the  scene  of  the 
89 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

opening  of  his  story  of  "  Tom  Paulding"  at  the 
western  end  of  Ninety-third  Street,  and  now, 
upon  a  corner  of  that  street  near  the  Hudson, 
we  find  the  elegant  modern  mansion  of  light- 
colored  brick  which  is  the  present  abode  of  that 
lucid  writer,  who  here  completed  "  Outlines  in 
Local  Color"  and  prepared  for  publication  his 
forthcoming  book  "  The  Historic  Novel  and 
Other  Essays."  Not  far  distant  in  this  then 
secluded  and  picturesque  region  General  Morris 
saw,  beside  a  leafy  woodland  lane,  the  venerable 
tree  whose  associations  with  the  childhood  of  a 
friend  drew  from  him  the  famous  lyric  "  Wood 
man,  Spare  that  Tree."  Some  distance  beyond, 
in  a  remote  roadside  hostelry  at  the  edge  of  the 
"  Claremont  Hill"  of  Dr.  van  Dyke's  poem, 
Halleck  sojourned  for  a  summer  and  wrote  his 
satirical  epiclet  "  Fanny."  A  well-preserved, 
two-storied,  flat-roofed  frame  structure,  now 
used  for  a  school  and  a  little  way  removed  from 
its  site  at  One  Hundred  and  Forty-third  Street, 
was  the  country-seat  of  the  great  writer  of  "  The 
Federalist,"  whence,  one  fateful  July  morning, 
he  crossed  the  river  to  his  death  at  Weehawken, 
The  cluster  of  thirteen  trees,  which  he  planted 
in  token  of  the  original  union  of  the  States,  yet 
stands,  but  has  been  lately  offered  for  sale. 
A  few  furlongs  northward  is  the  beautiful 
90 


Matthews — 'Audubon — Halleck 

place  which  Audubon  created  and  called  "  Min- 
niesland"  in  honor  of  his  wife.  Here  we  find 
the  trees  he  planted  still  bowering  the  mansion 
he  erected  by  the  river-bank.  The  house  is 
somewhat  changed,  and  is  menaced  with  demoli 
tion  to  make  room  for  a  river-side  drive ;  but 
we  still  may  see,  at  the  right  facing  the  Hudson, 
the  room  in  which  much  work  was  done  upon 
"  The  Quadrupeds  of  America."  Here,  too, 
he  produced  many  of  his  drawings  and  paintings, 
some  of  which  are  preserved  by  his  grand 
daughter,  who  resides  in  the  neighborhood.  In 
the  adjoining  apartment,  now  the  dining-room, 
he  rested  in  his  final  decline,  to  be  near  his 
beloved  work,  and  here  he  died.  From  a  base 
ment  room  Audubon's  friend  Morse  despatched 
the  first  telegram  ever  sent  from  Manhattan. 
Griswold,  Bryant,  Godwin,  and  Basil  Hall 
were  here  among  Audubon's  many  guests.  His 
nearest  neighbor  was  the  widow  of  Aaron  Burr, 
then  living  in  the  historic  Morris-Jumel  house, 
a  palatial  frame  structure  still  standing  upon  its 
sightly  eminence  nearer  the  northern  confines 
of  the  island.  Aforetime  this  was  the  home  of 
Mary  Philipse,  who  was  vainly  wooed  by  Wash 
ington,  and  who  has  been,  without  reason,  be 
lieved  to  be  depicted  in  the  heroine  of  Cooper's 
"  Spy."  Here  Talleyrand  was  an  honored 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

guest,  and  presented  to  the  hostess  the  stand — 
now  preserved  by  her  grand-niece — upon  which 
Voltaire  wrote  his  famous  "  Philosophical  Dic 
tionary."  A  shady  spot  upon  the  lawn  just  east 
of  the  house,  whence  we  overlook  the  glittering 
Harlem  to  the  Sound,  great  reaches  of  West- 
chester  and  Long  Island,  the  length  of  the 
opulent  city  "  nested  in  water-bays,"  and  the 
verdure-clad  slopes  beyond  the  harbor,  was  a 
favorite  lounging-place  of  Halleck  during  his 
visits  to  his  friend  Pell  in  the  old  mansion  ;  and 
here  one  summer  Sunday  afternoon,  with  this 
enchanting  prospect  greeting  his  vision,  he  wrote 
the  inspiring  lyric  "  Marco  Bozzaris." 

Nor  will  the  district  lying  eastward  of  Fifth 
Avenue  less  abundantly  reward  the  quest  of  the 
literary  pilgrim.  In  the  apartment-house  at  the 
northeast  corner  of  that  avenue  and  Twenty- 
second  Street  was  for  several  years  the  residence 
of  Noah  Brooks,  who  here  produced  "The 
Fairport  Nine"  and  other  of  his  admirable  books 
for  boys ;  early  in  his  literary  career  Stephen 
Crane,  the  author  of  "  The  Red  Badge  of  Cour 
age,"  lodged  near  by  upon  the  upper  floor  of 
the  house  No.  33  East  Twenty-second  Street 
and  essayed  his  vigorous  and  successful  work. 
Madison  Square  will  long  be  remembered  as  the 
92 


Crane — Mrs.  Barr — Melville — Brooks 

quondam  home  of  William  Allen  Butler's  Flora 
McFlimsy  ;  and  the  adjacent  avenues  were  once 
the  habitations  of  the  many  of  her  kin  and  kind 
whose  foibles  and  shams  were  objects  of  the 
gentle  satire  of  Curtis's  "  Potiphar  Papers."  In 
the  hotel  opposite  the  lower  end  of  the  Square 
Mrs.  Barr  resided  during  a  recent  winter,  and 
here  wrote  her  powerful  and  dramatic  "  Pris 
oners  of  Conscience."  Across  the  Square,  in 
the  brownstone  house  No.  44  East  Twenty- 
sixth  Street,  Stedman  dwelt  when  he  completed 
his  "  Library  of  American  Literature."  Haw 
thorne's  friend  Herman  Melville,  whose  tales 
"Typee,"  "  Omoo,"  and  "Moby  Dick"  once 
gave  him  wide  reputation  and  were  received  by 
the  critics  with  pasans  of  praise,  lived  for  many 
years  and  died  at  No.  104  of  the  same  street,  in 
a  pleasant  brick  house  which  is  now  replaced 
by  flats.  Here  he  wrote  "  Sheridan  at  Cedar 
Creek,"  other  "  Battle  Pieces,"  and  volumes  of 
now  little-read  verse.  A  narrow  stone  dwelling 
in  Twenty-eighth  Street  a  few  doors  east  from 
Fifth  Avenue  is  the  residence  of  Noah  Brooks, 
who  has  here  been  employed  upon  a  life  of 
General  Knox — the  biographer  being  a  relative 
by  marriage  of  the  subject  of  his  biography — 
and  upon  other  historical  work ;  this  house  has 
been  for  the  past  seven  years  the  New  Yorlr 
93 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

home  of  the  writer  of  such  effective  fiction  as 
"  Soldiers  of  Fortune,"  "  The  King's  Jackal," 
etc.,  Richard  Harding  Davis,  who  here  wrote 
most  of  his  captivating  stories  and  travels ;  here, 
too,  lives  the  author  and  playwright  Stephen 
Fiske,  of  "  My  Noble  Son-in-Law,"  "  Offhand 
Portraits,"  etc. ;  and  here  Stephen  Bonsai  com 
posed  his  book  upon  Cuba  and  the  greater  part 
of  his  recent  narratives  of  travel  in  the  Far  East. 

At  88  Madison  Avenue  James  Lane  Allen 
finished  that  exquisite  tale  of  Kentucky's  green 
wilderness,  "  The  Choir  Invisible,  " — thus  far 
his  best  book ;  around  the  corner  in  Twenty- 
ninth  Street  we  find  Mrs.  Burton  Harrison  de 
lightfully  domiciled  in  a  handsome  four-storied 
dwelling,  where  she  has  written  several  sprightly 
and  popular  novels,  from  "  A  Bachelor  Maid" 
to  "  Good  Americans," — including  "  An  Errant 
Wooing,"  which  is  understood  to  be  her  favorite. 
The  pleasant  brick  house  45  Thirtieth  Street, 
near  Fourth  Avenue,  was  for  several  years 
owned,  and  a  part  of  the  time  occupied,  by  the 
widow  of  Bayard  Taylor  :  it  was  to  this  house 
that  Mr.  Stedman  removed  after  his  financial 
reverse,  and  from  it  he  gave  forth  his  compre 
hensive  study  of  "  The  Poets  of  America." 

In  Thirty-fourth  Street  east  of  Lexington 
Avenue,  an  attractive  brownstone  house  with  a 
94 


Hopkinson  Smith — Holland — Godwin 

studio-window  in  its  roof  is  the  residence  of 
the  author-artist  F.  Hopkinson  Smith,  whom,  in 
our  "  Oldest  New  York"  ramble,  we  discovered 
in  an  office  of  Exchange  Place  disguised  as  a 
constructing  engineer.  To  this  artistic  home 
the  engineer  apparently  is  never  admitted,  but 
here  the  author  has  written  all  his  breezy  and 
delightful  books,  from  "  Tom  Crogan"  to 
"  Colonel  Carter"  and  the  more  recent  "  Caleb 
West."  Colonel  John  Hay  accomplished  some 
of  the  work  upon  his  "  Lincoln"  in  the  spacious 
mansion  at  the  corner  of  Thirty-sixth  Street  and 
Lexington  Avenue,  at  that  time  the  residence  of 
Whitelaw  Reid.  The  lamented  Dr.  Holland 
lived  and  died  around  in  Park  Avenue,  in  the 
house  No.  46,  where  some  of  his  best-known 
books  were  written,  including  "  Arthur  Bonni- 
castle,"  "  Sevenoaks,"  and  "  Nicholas  Min- 
turn  ;"  near  by  in  the  same  thoroughfare,  in  a 
dwelling  which  has  been  replaced  by  an  apart 
ment-house,  Mrs.  Barr  produced  her  first  novel, 
"Jan  Vedder's  Wife."  A  block  or  so  north 
ward  is  the  elegant  home  of  Parke  Godwin, 
editor,  novelist,  essayist,  biographer,  in  a  high- 
stooped  brownstone  mansion  of  Thirty-seventh 
Street,  where,  amid  a  houseful  of  curios  and 
works  of  art,  he  treasures  many  mementos  and 
personal  belongings  of  his  father-in-law,  Bryant, 
95 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

embracing  the  Jarvis  portrait,  Launt  Thomp 
son's  marble  bust,  and  Durand's  painting  of  the 
Catskills,  in  which  the  great  poet  and  his  friend 
Cole  are  introduced.  A  four-story  stone  dwell 
ing  a  few  doors  east  of  Fifth  Avenue  in  the 
same  street  has.  been  for  several  years  the  resi 
dence  of  Dr.  Henry  van  Dyke,  who,  in  his 
cosey  study  on  the  second  floor,  sits  among  his 
books  and  Tennyson  treasures  to  write  such  en 
joyable  works  as  "  Little  Rivers,"  "  The  Build 
ers,"  etc.,  his  distinctively  religious  treatises 
being  produced  in  the  library  at  his  church  just 
across  the  Avenue.  That  forceful  author  Carl 
Schurz  lives  and  writes  in  a  house  crowded 
with  literary,  historical,  and  artistic  souvenirs 
near  the  east  side  of  Central  Park  in  Sixty- 
fourth  Street ;  his  later  work  has  been  chiefly 
editorial,  but  he  has  given  some  time  to  a  biog 
raphy  of  Charles  Sumner,  which  may  soon  be 
completed.  It  was  in  the  second-story  front 
room  of  the  brownstone  house  No.  3  Sixty- 
sixth  Street  that  General  Grant,  tortured  by 
fatal  illness,  worked  upon  the  "  Memoirs" 
whose  sale  was  to  maintain  his  family  after  his 
fight  with  grim-visaged  death  was  ended.  A 
handsome  stone  mansion  just  out  of  Fifth  Ave 
nue  in  Seventy-fourth  Street  is  the  residence  of 
the  erudite  General  James  Grant  Wilson,  where 
96 


Van    Dyke — Schurz — Wilson — Fuller 

Lowell,  Motley,  Dana,  Boker,  Bayard  Taylor, 
and  other  famed  authors  have  been  entertained, 
as  well  as  the  military  heroes  and  writers,  Grant, 
Sherman,  and  Sheridan.  At  the  entrance  to 
this  house  Bryant  suffered  the  casualty  that 
caused  his  death,  falling  backward,  in  a  syncope, 
from  the  vestibule  and  striking  his  head  heavily 
upon  the  stone  platform  of  the  steps.  In  his 
opulent  library  here  General  Wilson  has  pro 
duced  the  valuable  historical  and  biographical 
works  with  which  he  has  enriched  our  literature. 
Following  the  margin  of  the  picturesque  East 
River,  we  find  by  the  foot  of  Forty-ninth 
Street  the  place  of  Horace  Greeley's  sometime 
suburban  residence, — the  home  of  the  American 
sibyl  Margaret  Fuller  during  her  stay  in  New 
York, — covered  now  by  modern  buildings.  It 
was  a  charming  old  place  of  eight  acres,  with 
flowers,  lawns,  and  great  trees  on  every  side, 
and  an  old-fashioned  yellow  house  whose  wide 
veranda  overlooked  the  river  with  its  sails  and 
Blackwell's  Island,  where  much  of  Margaret's 
benevolent  work  was  done.  In  this  home,  be 
sides  her  musical  and  dramatic  critiques  and 
general  essays,  she  wrote  the  dissertations  upon 
Shelley,  Milton,  Richter,  Carlyle,  Balzac,  Long 
fellow,  George  Sand,  and  other  literary  notables. 
A  brook  which  flowed  behind  the  house  was 
7  97 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

aforetime  spanned  some  blocks  above,  near 
Third  Avenue,  by  a  structure  claimed  to  have 
been  the  "  Kissing  Bridge"  of  "  Salmagundi" 
and  of  Burnaby's  more  sober  narrative  ;  but  the 
similar  claim  made  for  another  fabric  a  little 
northward  indicates  that  all  the  osculating  of  the 
youths  and  maidens  of  that  time  was  not  done 
upon  any  one  bridge.  On  First  Avenue,  two 
blocks  above  Greeley's,  stood  the  historic  Beek- 
man  villa,  commemorated  in  the  writings  of 
Madame  Riedesel,  and  along  the  river-shore  for 
furlongs  above  stretched  the  grounds  of  "  the 
Joneses,  the  Schermerhorns,  and  the  Rhine- 
landers"  of  Knickerbocker's  time,  through  a 
region  of  diverse  beauties  of  land  and  water, 
which  is  redolent  still  of  associations  with 
Irving.  Most  of  the  quaint  mansions  he  knew 
here  have  gone  down  before  the  rage  of  specula 
tion  ;  but  a  very  few,  like  the  Lefferts  house  in 
Ninety-first  Street,  where  he  was  a  summer's 
guest,  yet  stand,  shorn  of  their  bright  fields  and 
hedged  in  by  masses  of  brick  and  mortar. 
Grade's  point  still,  "  like  an  elephant,  carries 
its  fair  castle  upon  its  back,"  its  bluff  promon 
tory  frowning  upon  the  river  as  it  did  when 
Oloffe  Van  Kortlandt  voyaged  there.  Gracie's 
castle  and  some  acres  of  its  lawn  are  incorporated 
into  the  East  River  Park,  and  we  may  wander 
98 


Grade's  Castle — Astor — Irving 

at  will  on  the  ample  verandas  and  through  the 
spacious  old  rooms,  which  are  haunted  with 
memories  of  such  guests  as  "  Anacreon"  Moore, 
Louis  Philippe,  Emmet,  Drake,  Paulding,  Ban 
croft,  Halleck,  and  Irving.  The  trees  beneath 
which  they  loitered  in  brilliant  discourse  still 
crown  the  headland  and  cluster  about  the  house, 
and  from  their  umbrage  we  look  out  upon  the 
beautiful  panorama  of  the  river  with  its  many 
passing  craft,  the  verdant  islands  and  capes  of 
the  upper  channel,  the  turbulent  Hell  Gate, 
where  the  affrighted  Pavonian  voyagers  were  in 
such  peril  of  the  hobgoblins,  and  the  farther 
green  slopes  of  Long  Island. 

Irving  called  Grade's  house  one  of  his  "strong 
holds,"  at  the  time  he  sojourned  with  Astor 
scarcely  a  city  block  distant.  Astor's  place 
was  one  of  the  last  to  give  way  to  the  advancing 
tide  of  population,  the  remnant  of  its  grounds 
having  been  only  recently  overbuilt.  A  row 
of  five-storied  brick  houses  on  the  south  side 
of  Eighty-eighth  Street  west  of  East  End  Ave 
nue  covers  now  the  spot  where,  amid  smiling 
fields,  and  with  bowering  orchards  at  the  back 
and  wide  lawns  sloping  to  the  river-edge  in 
front,  Astor  maintained  "  a  kind  of  bachelors' 
hall"  in  an  unpretentious  two-storied  square 
frame  dwelling,  with  a  broad  porch  which 
99 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

looked  upon  the  seething  Hell  Gate.  Halleck 
and  Bristed  (Carl  Benson)  were  usually  resident 
here,  and  Irving,  attracted  by  admiration  for 
the  host  and  fondness  for  the  grateful  quiet  and 
freedom  of  the  place,  came  often,  tarried  long, 
and  was  so  inspirited  by  the  environment  that 
he  here  produced  more  than  he  ever  did  else 
where  in  the  same  period  of  time.  Here  that 
"  rich  piece  of  mosaic,"  "  Astoria,"  was  writ 
ten  ;  here  Irving  knew  Captain  Bonneville,  the 
hero  of  another  book,  and  met  some  of  his  com 
panions,  whose  conversation  with  the  author 
supplemented  Bonneville's  journals  in  supplying 
materials  for  the  volume  of  "  Adventures." 

Here  this  imperfect  record  of  the  Manhattan 
pilgrimage  might  fitly  end, — the  more  fitly  be 
cause,  although  the  writer  has  purposely  omitted 
even  mention  of  many  shrines,  and  has  doubt 
less  unwittingly  passed  many  more,  the  record 
has  far  exceeded  its  designed  limits.  But  a 
single  sacred  spot  lures  us  beyond  the  Harlem  : 
it  is  the  sepulchre  of  one  who  by  every  circum 
stance  of  his  life  and  labors  was  so  closely 
associated  with  his  native  island,  and  who  sleeps 
in  death  so  near  its  shores,  that  his  grave  may 
properly  enough  be  regarded  as  one  of  Manhat 
tan's  shrines, — Joseph  Rodman  Drake. 


Bonneville — Hunt's    Point  Cemetery 

From  the  Southern  Boulevard  a  delightful 
walk  southward  along  a  leafy  avenue,  past  shady 
copses,  flowering  fields,  and  embowered  villas, 
brings  us  to  an  arm  of  the  marsh  which  borders 
the  Bronx ;  beyond  this  we  come  upon  the 
lonely  God's-acre  which  holds  our  shrine. 
The  enclosure  is  close  beside  the  highway,  at 
the  verge  of  an  island  in  the  marsh,  and  occu 
pies  a  symmetrical  mound,  two  or  three  roods  in 
extent,  which  is  now  a  woful  scene  of  neglect 
and  desolation.  The  wooden  paling  is  fallen 
and  decayed,  the  trees  have  multiplied  until 
they  shroud  the  spot  in  twilight  gloom,  their 
scions  riot  unchecked  in  and  among  the  old 
graves,  and  the  place  is  now  a  matted  waste  of 
brush  and  brier.  A  few  of  the  taller  monu 
ments  rise  above  this  wild  tangle,  but  the  hum 
bler  memorials  are  concealed  beneath  it,  where 
we  find  them  standing  aslant  and  awry  over  the 
sunken  graves,  or  ehe  pressed  to  earth  beneath 
decaying  trees  whose  fall'  has  broken  or  over 
turned  them.  But,  poor  as  is  this  resting-pkce, 
the  dead  may  not  be  allowed  to  repose  even 
here ;  a  projected  new  thoroughfare  menaces 
the  little  cemetery,  and  its  complete  or  partial 
destruction  is  apparently  only  a  question  of  time. 

The  name  "  Hunt"  upon  some  of  the  older 
gravestones  reminds  us  that  this  was  the  ceme- 
101 


Literary  Haunts  of  Manhattan 

tery  of  the  family  whom  Drake  used  to  visit 
near  by,  and  anew  calls  attention  to  the  pathetic 
changes  that  have  ruined  the  spot  which  the 
poet  loved  and  chose  for  his  sepulchre.  A 
rugged  path  broken  in  the  wild  boscage  leads 
from  the  highway  a  few  yards  up  the  slope  to 
his  grave.  It  is  marked  by  a  square  altar-stone 
set  upon  a  marble  pedestal  and  surmounted  by  a 
diminutive  shaft,  partially  protected  now  by  a 
railing  of  iron  bars.  Graven  in  the  stone  we  read 
the  poet's  name  and  brief  years,  with  the  lines, 
adapted  from  Halleck's  poem  to  his  dead  frier/d, — 

"  None  knew  him  but  to  love  him, 
None  named  him  but  to  praise." 

For  many  years  Drake's  grave  was  waste  and 
neglected  :  the  stone  was  overgrown,  lichened, 
disjointed,  broken ;  a  fallen  tree  had  thrown 
the  tapering  shaft  to  the  ground.  Now  a 
Catholic  club  of  the  vicinage  has  beneficently 
assumed  care  of  it,  the  monument  is  cleansed 
and  renovated,  and  the  brush  is  cleared  away 
from  its  base.  The  steep  little  pathway  is  evi 
dently  trodden  by  many  pilgrim  feet,  and  we 
find  a  garland  of  myrtle  crowning  the  obelisk, 
while  fresh  field-flowers — gathered,  we  hope, 
from  the  near-by  fields  where  he  loved  to  roam 
— lie  upon  the  pedestal  and  are  still  aglitter 
with  the  dew  of  the  morning. 

102 


Grave  of  Rodman  Drake 

The  poet's  grave  is  fitly  placed  amid  the 
scenes  he  loved  and  sung.  Yonder  "  his  own 
romantic  Bronx"  lazily  skirts  the  "  green  bank 
side"  where  he  wrote ;  southward  stands  the 
venerable  mansion  he  so  often  visited,  where  we 
may  see  the  room  he  and  Halleck  habitually  oc 
cupied  ;  and  all  about  the  old  place  lie  shores  and 
scenes  which  inspired  portions  of  his  charming 
"  Culprit  Fay"  and  are  portrayed  in  its  imagery. 
Even  in  the  desolate  old  cemetery  we  realize 
some  of  his  poetic  phrases  :  we  feel  the  breeze 
"  fresh  springing  from  the  lips  of  morn,"  we 
see  the  hum-bird  with  "  his  sun-touched  wings," 
we  hear  the  carol  of  the  finch  and  the  <f  wind 
ing  of  the  merry  locust's  horn"  above  the  grave 
where  the  poet  rests,  reckless  of  these  that  once 
thrilled  his  senses  and  stirred  his  soul  to  song. 
As  we  look  out  thence  upon  the  languorous 
landscape  flooded  with  sunshine  and  domed  by 
a  cloudless  sky,  we  are  reminded  of  other  sum 
mer  days,  when,  in  its  happier  state,  this  spot 
was  a  grateful  resting-place  in  his  walks  afield  ; 
then  we  think  of  that  last  sad  summer,  of  the 
early  autumn  day  when  loving  hands  laid  him 
here  for  the  long,  dreamless  sleep,  and  of  the 
sorrow-stricken  Halleck  protesting,  as  he  went 
forth  from  this  place,  "  There  will  be  less  sun 
shine  for  me  hereafter,  now  that  Joe  is  gone." 
103 


HOMES  AND  HAUNTS  OF  FOE 

Fordham  Cottage-  The  Rooms-Neighbors-Reminiscences—Sepul 
chre  of "  Annabel  Lee" -Poe  Park-Philadelphia  Shrine* 
—Richmond  Haunts  and  Scenes-House  and  Grave  of 
<f  Helen**— Other  Richmond  Friends-Baltimore  Homes- 
«  Mary" -Where  Poe  died-Tomb. 

the  few  remaining  places  which  were 
associated  with  the  strange,  sad  career  of 
Poe  and  with  the  production  of  the  wondrous 
poems  whose  harmonies  have  thrilled  the  world, 
the  humble  little  cottage  on  the  Fordham  hill 
top  is  pre-eminent  in  the  interest  and  regard  of 
his  many  admirers.  The  pathetic  circumstances 
of  his  life  there,  with  its  miseries  and  debase 
ments,  the  fact  that  it  was  not  merely  the  last 
and  longest  but  almost  the  only  home  really  his 
own  which  the  time-tossed  poet  ever  knew 
during  his  brilliant  and  erratic  course,  that 
there  were  written  stanzas  which  are  known 
and  loved  wherever  men  read,  render  the  lowly 
dwelling  a  shrine  which  attracts  many  pilgrim 
feet. 

From  the  haunts  of  Halleck  and  the  grave  of 
Drake  a  stroll  along  the  valley  of  the  romantic 
Bronx  brings  us  to  the  once  quiet  village  above 
which  steeply  rises  the  acclivity  upon  whose 
crest  stands  the  hallowed  relic  of  a  unique  and 
104 


The  Cottage  at  Fordham 

dazzling  genius.  The  cottage  is  pathetically 
poor,  small,  and  shabby,  and  rude  hands  have 
recently  robbed  it  of  the  environment  of  shrub 
and  spray  and  vine  which  once  imparted  grace 
and  picturesque  beauty  to  its  walls,  leaving  them 
now  bleak  and  bare.  A  projected  widening  of 
the  highway  which  would  bisect  the  structure 
has  necessitated  its  removal  backward  into  the 
garden ;  the  noble  cherry-trees  which  were  in 
bloom  when  Poe  came  to  dwell  beneath  their 
shade  and  whose  wide-spreading  branches  liter 
ally  embraced  the  tiny  homelet  have,  save  only 
one  decaying  remnant,  disappeared ;  the  acre  of 
garden  and  sward  which  in  his  time  encom 
passed  the  cottage  has  been  encroached  upon  by 
pretentious  "  villas"  till  but  the  narrowest  space 
remains ;  the  plot  where  erst  the  brooding  poet 
planted  flowering  beds  of  heliotrope,  mignonette, 
and  dahlias  has  disappeared  beneath  an  ornate 
dwelling  which  fairly  jostles  its  humble  neighbor. 
The  little  cottage  itself  is  a  low-eaved,  box- 
shaped,  story-and-a-half  structure,  dating  from 
about  1820,  and  has  been  changed  since  that 
time  only  by  the  addition  of  a  lower  kitchen  at 
the  back.  The  gabled  end  faces  the  highway, 
the  walls  are  clad  with  shingles,  a  broad  veranda 
shades  the  entrance  and  extends  along  the  length 
of  the  side,  and  little  square  windows,  like  port- 
105 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

holes,  peep  from  the  gables  into  street  and 
garden. 

At  the  right  of  the  narrow  vestibule  is  a  low- 
ceiled  parlor  of  moderate  dimensions  with  two 
windows  opening  upon  the  veranda  and  a  third 
which  in  Poe's  time  looked,  between  clustering 
lilacs,  away  northward  over  an  expanse  of  lovely 
landscape.  Opening  out  of  this  apartment  is  a 
diminutive  sleeping-room  scarce  larger  than  a 
closet ;  above,  reached  from  the  hall-way  by  a 
steep  winding  stair,  is  the  cheerless  attic  cham 
ber  where  Poe  kept  his  scanty  library  and  ac 
complished  his  more  elaborate  literary  work. 
It  is  lighted  by  the  smallest  and  quaintest  of 
windows,  its  sloping  roof  is  so  low  that  one 
may  scarcely  stand  erect  beneath  it,  and  against 
one  end  wall  is  an  irregularly  shouldered  chim 
ney  with  a  deep-throated  fireplace.  Adjoining 
is  the  contracted  little  closet  which  was  Mrs. 
Clemm's  bedchamber,  and  these  few  poor  rooms, 
with  an  outside  kitchen,  were  all  the  lowly  home 
afforded.  Yet  it  was  the  most  comfortable  and 
grateful  refuge  the  wayward  poet  ever  knew  after 
unrest  and  "  unmerciful  disaster"  had  started  him 
upon  his  wanderings. 

Some  who  remember  him  here  testify  that  the 
little  place  had  a  delightfully  cosey  and  attractive 
aspect,  and  was  as  pleasant  a  home  as  the  pinch- 
106 


Fordham  Homelet  and  its  Inmates 

ing  poverty  and  the  besetting  infirmities  of  its 
unhappy  master  would  permit.  Blooming  vines 
rioted  upon  the  porch  and  overran  the  roof,  the 
perfume  of  flowers  floated  through  the  windows, 
birds  lived  and  sang  in  the  boughs  above  the 
door.  The  rooms  were  scantily  set  forth  with 
furniture  purchased  out  of  the  proceeds  of  Poe's 
libel  suit  against  the  author  of  "  Ben  Bolt,"  but 
the  neatness  and  taste  of  the  occupants  imparted 
to  everything  an  air  of  refinement  and  gentility. 
A  visitor  describes  for  us  these  inmates  as  she 
often  saw  them  here  :  Mrs.  Clemm, — the  "  more 
than  mother"  of  Poe's  quatorzain, — tall,  sprightly, 
and  talkative,  in  worn  dress  of  rusty  black  ;  Vir 
ginia,  wan  and  wasted,  with  glossy  black  hair 
that  made  her  pallor  seem  deathly,  and  with  great 
brilliant  eyes  that  "  shone  too  brightly  to  shine 
long ;"  the  poet,  with  pale  and  intellectual  face 
that  seldom  smiled,  with  dark  clustering  hair, 
with  large  and  lustrous  eyes  that  glowed  with 
feeling,  with  slender  and  erect  figure  neatly — 
often  insufficiently — clad  in  threadbare  garments 
of  sable  hue,  proud  of  mien  and  port,  yet  dis 
playing,  in  feature,  form,  and  garb,  evidences 
of  pinching  want  heroically  endured  in  order 
that  his  invalid  wife  might  have  needed  com 
forts. 

Save  in   furniture  and   hangings,  the   apart- 
107 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

ments  are  unchanged  since  Poe  passed  here  the 
fevered  years  which  brought  to  him  so  much  of 
suffering  and  gave  to  us  such  treasure  of  mar 
vellous  verse,  and  as  we  linger  within  the  haunted 
rooms  it  seems  easy  to  recall  the  presences  and 
events  they  have  known.  This  little  parlor  was 
Poe's  sitting-room ;  its  floor  was  then  covered 
with  checked  matting,  small  bookshelves  holding 
presentation  volumes  hung  against  this  side  wall, 
the  plaster  cast  of  a  raven  perched  above  yonder 
door;  between  these  front  windows  a  writing- 
table  was  placed,  and  above  it  an  engraving  of 
"  The  Lost  Lenore  ;"  four  chairs  and  a  little 
stand  were  disposed  about  the  room  and  com 
pleted  its  meagre  furnishing.  In  this  room  the 
poet  received  as  guests  Willis,  "  Stella"  Lewis, 
Mrs.  Osgood,  Margaret  Fuller,  Ann  S.  Stephens, 
and  other  litterateurs,  and  at  his  table  here  much 
of  his  critical  work  was  done.  On  the  veranda 
just  without  these  windows  he  paced  during  the 
silent  hours  of  many  a  night  as  he  planned  and 
elaborated  his  "  Eureka"  with  its  speculative 
theory  of  the  problem  of  the  universe.  For 
some  weeks  before  her  death  the  poor  straw 
pallet  of  his  wife — once  the  artless  "  Eleanora" 
of  his  fancy — stood  against  the  wall  by  yonder 
back  window,  where  Mrs.  Gove  found  her,  in 
chill  mid-winter,  with  "  no  bedclothing  but  a 
108 


Cottage   Rooms — Associations — Study 

snow-white  counterpane  and  sheets.  She  lay 
wrapped  in  her  husband's  great  coat  with  a  large 
tortoise-shell  cat  in  her  bosom.  The  cat  and 
the  coat  were  the  sufferer's  only  means  of 
warmth,  except  as  her  husband  held  her  hands 
and  her  mother  her  feet."  A  little  later  her 
coffin  rested  here  upon  the  poet's  writing-table 
while  a  few  of  his  literary  friends,  with  his 
neighbors  and  the  "  Mary"  of  his  first  betrothal, 
assembled  in  the  funeral  of  one  "  doubly  dead 
in  that  she  died  so  young." 

In  the  seclusion  of  the  dismal  chamber  over 
head  Poe  accomplished  some  of  his  best  work, 
composing  while  he  "  walked  the  floor  with  one 
hand  behind  his  back  and  biting  the  nails  of  the 
other  hand  until  the  blood  came,"  as  one  visitor 
informs  the  writer.  A  round  table  was  before 
the  fireplace,  his  chair — still  existing  in  the 
neighborhood — beside  it,  and  in  this  spot,  while 
enduring  poignant  mental  distress  as  well  as 
physical  ills  and  exhaustion,  he  perfected  the 
chiming  "  Bells"  and  wrote  the  soaring  and 
nebulous  rhapsody  of  "  Eureka,"  the  weird, 
despairing  requiem  of  "  Ulalume"  and  some  of 
his  famous  fiction.  Here,  too,  with  the  cat  that 
had  been  her  pet  purring  upon  his  shoulder,  he 
wrote  his  last  lyric,  the  musical  dirge  for  his 
dead  wife,  "  Annabel  Lee."  In  this  room  he 
109 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

was  sometimes  imprisoned  during  "  bad  spells," 
when  the  mother  would  gather  from  his  waste- 
basket  manuscript  which  his  critical  taste  had 
rejected  and  endeavor  to  sell  it  in  order  to  pro 
cure  needed  food, — going  from  office  to  office, 
as  Willis  said,  tearfully  pleading  his  illness  and 
destitution. 

A  rocky  ledge  which  crowns  the  cliff  at  the 
bottom  of  the  garden  was  in  Poe's  time  darkly 
shaded  by  sighing  pines  and  commanded  a  superb 
prospect  extending  from  the  picturesque  Palisades 
eastward  across  the  Sound  to  a  far  horizon  of 
shadowy  hills  on  Long  Island.  The  seclusion 
of  this  spot  accorded  well  with  the  brooding 
moods  of  the  poet,  whose  spirit  haunted  the  dim 
borderlands  of  the  unreal,  and  here,  while  the 
pines  murmured  to  him  of  mystery,  he  sat  apart 
in  long  summer  days  and  still,  starlit  nights 
wrestling  with  sorrow,  linking  fancies  that  be 
came  deathless  poems,  or  pondering  his  solution 
of  the  eternal  secrets  of  life  and  nature.  This 
hallowed  spot  is  now  partially  overbuilt  by  a 
stable,  the  pines  are  replaced  by  fruit-trees, 
the  outlook — obstructed  by  buildings  and  foliage 
— is  narrowed  to  the  beautiful  vale  of  the 
Bronx. 

The  present  writer  has  had  the  acquaintance 
of  several  of  Poe's  neighbors  and  visitors  here, 
no 


Poe's  Neighbors — Reminiscences 

a  few  of  whom  yet  survive.  One  of  these  re 
members  seeing  the  poet  for  the  first  time  as  he 
stood  upon  a  branch  of  the  great  cherry-tree 
whose  stump,  now  a  jagged  ruin,  stands  by  the 
road-side  paling ;  he  was  tossing  twigs  of  the 
ripe  fruit  to  his  wife,  who,  arrayed  in  white,  sat 
upon  a  bank  of  turf  beneath  the  tree  and  was 
laughing  and  calling  up  to  him  when  suddenly 
the  snowy  breast  of  her  gown  was  crimsoned  by 
a  profuse  haemoptysis,  and  the  poet,  springing  to 
the  ground,  bore  her  fainting  form  into  the  cot 
tage.  Another,  who  lived  not  far  away,  saw  the 
notice  of  Poe's  death  in  a  newspaper,  and,  going 
to  the  cottage  to  apprise  Mrs.  Clemm,  found  her 
preparing  to  accompany  the  poet  to  his  wedding 
in  Richmond  ;  seeing  the  paper  in  the  neighbor's 
hand,  Mrs.  Clemm  instantly  divined  the  sad 
truth,  and  exclaimed,  "  Eddie  is  dead  !  They've 
killed  my  boy  !  Had  I  been  there  to  nurse  him 
in  his  spell  he  would  not  have  died  !"  These 
and  other  neighbors,  who  were  cognizant  of  the 
abject  poverty  which  prevailed  at  the  little  cot 
tage  and  of  its  baneful  cause,  supplied  food  for 
the  family  and  delicacies  for  the  dying  Virginia. 
When  Poe  made  the  fateful  journey  to  the  South 
from  which  he  never  returned,  leaving  Mrs. 
Clemm  destitute  and  the  rent  many  months  in 
arrear,  they  cared  for  her,  and  it  was  their  con- 
iii 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

tributions  that  enabled  her  to  go  to  Baltimore 
after  his  life's  tragic  close.  Some  of  his  house 
hold  effects  have  been  preserved  by  these  friends, 
and  in  a  near-by  farmhouse  we  may  see  his  clock, 
which  still  marks  the  hours,  his  rocking-chair, 
and  his  Bible, — a  plain  leather-bound,  octavo 
volume  without  inscription  or  record. 

It  was  his  neighbors,  too,  who  mostly  made 
up  the  little  funeral  cortege  which  attended  the 
sorrowing  poet  one  bitter  winter's  day  when, 
wrapped  in  the  coat  that  had  covered  his  dying 
wife,  he  followed  her  mortal  part  to  its  sepulture. 
She  was  laid  in  the  vault  of  the  family  of  his 
landlord  in  the  Dutch  Reformed  church-yard  on 
the  Kingsbridge  Road  some  furlongs  westward 
from  the  cottage,  and  to  this  spot,  through  rain 
and  cold,  he  often  came  to  beseech  her  guar 
dianship  and  to  keep  midnight  vigil  above  her 
grave.  For  many  years  her  body  mouldered  here, 
and  then  the  scant  remains  were  removed  to 
Baltimore  to  mingle  with  the  ashes  of  the  poet ; 
the  vault  itself  has  since  been  demolished,  and 
the  pilgrim  of  to-day  finds  an  unmarked  and  un 
broken  slope  of  sward  on  the  spot  where  the 
beautiful  "  Annabel  Lee"  was  erst  "  shut  up  in 
a  sepulchre." 

As  seen  in  its  present  position,  the  cottage 
stands  a  few  feet  eastward  from  its  original  site. 

112 


Poe  Park — Philadelphia  Shrines 

A  further  displacement  now  awaits  it :  an  at 
tempt  to  preserve  it  in  its  proper  place  having 
failed,  it  is  proposed  to  remove  it  to  a  small 
arbored  green  called  the  Poe  Park,  which  has 
been  recently  laid  out  upon  the  opposite  side  of 
the  highway.  A  bronze  statue  of  Poe  has  been 
designed  to  face  the  cottage  in  its  new  position, 
and  here,  overlooking  the  spot  where  it  sheltered 
the  deathless  poet,  that  lowly  dwelling  is  to  be 
preserved  and  cherished  as  one  of  the  choicest 
treasures  of  the  great  metropolis. 

"  Here  lived  the  soul  enchanted 

By  melody  of  song  ; 
Here  dwelt  the  spirit  haunted 

By  a  demoniac  throng  j 
Here  sang  the  lips  elated, 
Here  grief  and  death  were  sated ; 
Here  loved  and  here  unmated 

Was  he,  so  frail,  so  strong." 

In  Philadelphia,  en  route  to  the  sunny  land  of 
the  poet's  boyhood,  the  Poe  pilgrim  finds  little 
to  requite  his  search.  The  edifice  in  Dock 
Street,  near  the  Exchange,  in  which  Poe  was 
employed  as  editor  of  Burton's  Gentleman's 
Magazine  after  his  first  removal  from  New 
York,  has  disappeared  ;  and  the  more  lofty  and 
pretentious  building  by  Third  and  Chestnut 
Streets,  where  he  subsequently  edited  Graham's 
8  "3 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

and  more  than  septupled  its  circulation,  has 
been  rebuilt  and  for  many  years  used  for  other 
business.  A  mercantile  structure  long  ago  dis 
placed  the  tenement  in  Arch  Street  which  was 
hts  first  place  of  abode  in  the  Quaker  City, 
where  he  completed  the  "  Tales  of  the  Gro 
tesque  and  Arabesque"  and  pirated  the  text  of 
Captain  Brown's  treatise  on  Conchology. 

The  neighborhood  of  Twenty-fifth  Street 
and  Fairmount  Avenue  has  greatly  changed 
since  the  time  of  his  residence  there,  and  the 
site  of  his  poor  little  habitation — the  plank 
"  lean-to"  of  three  rooms,  with  an  upper 
chamber  whose  ceiling  was  so  low  that  it 
almost  touched  his  wife's  head  as  she  lay  in 
the  narrow  couch  after  her  first  hemorrhage  — 
is  occupied  now  by  one  of  a  row  of  brick  tene 
ments.  A  single  dwelling,  much  changed  and 
enlarged  but  still  used  as  a  habitation,  is  almost 
the  only  relic  Philadelphia  retains  of  Poe's  resi 
dence  there.  It  is  now  a  spacious,  three-storied, 
brick  domicile  standing  in  North  Seventh  Street 
just  above  Spring  Garden,  separated  by  a  con 
tracted  passage  from  an  old  stone  church.  The 
neighborhood  was  almost  suburban  in  Poe's 
time,  near-by  trees  harbored  field  song-birds, 
and  the  poet  had  a  garden  of  bright  flowers  in 
the  space  which  has  since  been  built  upon  in 
114 


Home  in  Philadelphia 

augmenting  the  little  house  he  knew.  In  winter 
these  flowers  ornamented  the  rooms,  and  when 
Poe  removed  to  New  York,  in  the  spring  of 
1844,  many  of  them  were  presented  to  his 
friend  Thomas  C.  Clarke,  who  was  to  have 
been  his  coparcener  in  the  long-projected  Stylus. 
This  home  was  the  scene  of  much  of  the  poet's 
pathetically  tender  care  of  his  sick  wife  to 
which  his  visitors  testified.  One  occasional 
caller  affirms  that  the  slightly  and  cheaply 
furnished  little  dwelling  was  so  neatly  kept  by 
Mrs.  Clemm,  and  had  such  an  air  of  taste  and 
culture,  that  it  seemed  altogether  a  suitable  home 
for  a  man  of  genius.  To  Poe  here  came  such 
visitors  as  Dr.  Griswold,  Captain  Mayne  Reid, 
and  the  older  Booth,  and  messages  of  friendly 
greeting  and  praise  from  Willis,  Irving,  Lowell, 
Dickens,  and  others  like  them.  Here,  too,  it 
has  been  said,  the  poet  wrote  "  The  Raven" 
but  Dr.  Matthew  Woods,  of  the  same  city,  will 
maintain  in  his  next  book  that  Henry  B.  Hirst 
and  not  Poe  was  the  poet  of  those  deathless 
stanzas.  Dr.  Woods  has  erected  in  his  resi 
dence,  upon  another  Philadelphia  street,  the 
mantelpieces  which  were  removed  from  this 
humble  home  of  Poe  at  the  time  of  its  renova 
tion  and  enlargement. 

Richmond,  superbly  seated  on  its  seven  hills, 
"5 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

is  rife  with  literary  associations.  Of  the  many 
litterateurs  who  have  made  that  historic  and 
picturesque  city  their  residence  or  sojourn,  Poe 
is  probably  the  one  whose  memory  is  best  be 
loved  and  most  honored.  Some  who  remem 
bered  the  poet  in  his  young  manhood  here  have 
been  known  to  the  writer,  and  a  member  of  the 
old  family  to  which  Poe's  first  sweetheart  be 
longed  has  been  his  companion  in  walks  about 
the  city  and  its  environs  that  lead  to  many 
scenes  the  poet  sometime  knew  and  loved.  Here, 
as  elsewhere,  few  relics  of  the  unhappy  bard  re 
main  ;  for  the  most  part  we  find  only  sites 
which  memory  hallows  by  association  with  him 
and  his  work. 

The  Monumental  Church  in  Broad  Street 
occupies  the  place  of  the  theatre  where  Poe's 
mother  played  but  a  short  time  before  her  death. 
Richmond's  "  Poe  expert,"  Mr.  Robert  Lee 
Traylor,  finds  at  the  corner  of  Fourteenth  Street 
and  Tobacco  Alley — covered  now  by  a  print 
ing  establishment — the  site  of  Ellis  &  Allan's 
tobacco  store,  above  which  Mr.  Allan  resided 
at  the  time  he  adopted  the  beautiful,  curly- 
haired  orphan  child,  Eddie  Poe,  into  his  house 
hold  ;  and  modern  tenements  stand  now  in  the 
place  of  the  wooden  building  on  Fifth  Street, 
near  Clay,  which  was  the  first  home  of  the 
116 


Richmond  Scenes 

Allans  after  their  foreign  sojourn  in  Poe's  boy 
hood,  and  from  which  they  removed  to  the 
famous  mansion  which  long  bore  their  name 
and  stood  a  few  blocks  southward.  This  had 
previously  been  occupied  by  the  proprietor  of 
the  Gallego  Mill, — with  whom  was  associated 
the  gifted  literator  Chevallie,  agent  of  Beau- 
marchais  the  dramatist, — and  it  is  said  that  the 
famous  author  of  "  Lalla  Rookh"  had  once 
been  there  a  guest. 

The  Allan  house  has  been  somewhat  unduly 
celebrated  by  Poe  writers,  the  poet's  connec 
tion  with  it  having  been  much  less  protracted 
and  intimate  than  has  generally  been  believed. 
In  earlier  visits  we  found  it  standing  in  a  sightly 
situation  at  the  corner  of  Main  and  Fifth  Streets, 
changed  only  by  neglect  and  decay  since  the 
time  Poe  dwelt  there.  It  was  a  spacious  and 
stately  two-storied  fabric  of  brick,  with  a  heavy, 
sloping  roof  whose  projecting  gable  was  upheld 
by  lofty  pillars  and  formed  an  imposing  portico 
in  front.  The  apartments  were  of  princely 
proportions  and  were  decorated  in  the  florid 
style  of  a  by-gone  time ;  at  the  left  of  the 
great  hall  were  the  drawing-rooms,  at  the  right 
a  reception-room  and,  back  of  that,  the  famous 
octagonal  dining-room  where  it  was  said  the 
precocious  boy  Poe  declaimed  for  the  delecta- 
117 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

tion  of  his  foster-father's  guests.  By  a  wide, 
mahogany-balustered  stair  we  mounted  to  the 
beautiful  parlor,  with  its  mirrors,  high  mantel, 
and  elaborate  carvings ;  the  bedchamber  that 
had  once  been  Poe's ;  the  larger  room  of  Allan 
which  was  the  reputed  scene  of  the  alleged 
violent  interview  between  him  and  the  poet 
when  the  former  lay  here  upon  his  death-bed. 
Outside  its  windows  was  a  broad  upper  balcony 
which  in  Poe's  time  overlooked  the  rushing 
river  with  its  green  islets  and  fretting  boulders, 
the  opposite  village  of  Manchester,  and  green 
slopes  and  wooded  hills  beyond.  Great  trees 
that  Poe  had  climbed  shaded  the  old  mansion, 
and  the  terraced  grounds  which  once  sloped 
away  towards  the  river  showed,  despite  present 
neglect,  evidences  of  former  beauty.  There 
were  blooming  parterres,  box-bordered  walks, 
copses  and  rows  of  figs  and  olives,  luxuriant 
shrubberies  of  myrtles  and  jasmines. 

All  now  is  changed  :  modern  buildings  have 
intercepted  the  lovely  prospect,  the  stately  man 
sion  has  been  demolished,  tree  and  shrub  have 
disappeared,  terraces  have  been  levelled,  a  re 
vival  "  Tabernacle"  which  for  a  time  occupied 
the  grounds  has  been  removed,  and  a  bare,  leaf 
less,  bladeless  plot  is  all  the  pilgrim  will  find  at 
this  shrine  of  a  transcending  genius.  A  grove 
118 


Allan  House— "  Helen" 

of  native  trees  in  the  ravine  near  the  man 
sion,  which  it  is  said  was  Poe's  favorite  play 
ground,  has  given  place  to  a  thoroughfare,  but 
the  spring  the  boy  knew  there  may  still  be 
found  beneath  a  house-porch.  A  few  rods  be 
yond  was  the  school  he  attended ;  the  poet, 
Susan  Archer  Weiss,  and  others  of  Poe's  later 
friends  remember  the  little  white  school-house 
with  its  moss-grown  well  and  giant  wil 
low  and  the  wood  violets  that  grew  all  about 
it. 

The  home  into  which  the  Mackenzies  adopted 
Poe's  sister  Rosalie,  a  large,  square,  frame  man 
sion  encompassed  by  piazzas,  which  stood  not 
far  from  the  Allan  house,  has  long  been  dis 
placed  by  a  brick  structure,  and  the  site  of  Jane 
Mackenzie's  school,  a  block  northward  from  the 
Allan  House,  is  now  occupied  by  the  residence 
of  a  brother  of  "  Marion  Harland."  The  girl 
hood  home  of  Poe's  earliest  inamorata,  Sarah 
Elmira  Royster,  likewise  can  no  longer  be 
found. 

More  fortunate  have  been  the  scenes  of  the 
most  tender  and  romantic  association  of  Poe's 
boyhood, — his  devotion  to  his  first  "  Lenore," 
Mrs.  Jane  Stith  Stanard,  the  friend  and  mentor 
whose  memory  drew  from  him  such  poems  as 
"  The  Paean,"  the  concluding  lines  of  "  The 
119 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

Sleeper,"  and    the    graceful    and  classical  lyric 
beginning, — 

"  Helen,  thy  beauty  is  to  me." 

A  word  of  information,  derived  from  her 
family,  concerning  this  lovely  woman  will  be  of 
interest  to  admirers  of  the  exquisite  verse  she 
inspired  :  she  was  the  daughter  of  Adam  Craig 
— clerk  of  the  Court  of  Appeals,  who  had  re 
moved  with  the  State  government  from  Wil- 
liamsburg  to  Richmond — and  wife  of  the  jurist 
and  legislator  Judge  Robert  Stanard.  Her  son, — 
Poe's  classmate  in  the  little  school  before  men 
tioned, — who  first  took  the  lonely  boy  to 
"  Helen's"  home  and  who,  when  Poe  made  his 
famous  swim  to  Warwick,  followed  him  along 
the  river-bank  (and  was  paternally  whipped  for 
it),  was  Robert  C.  Stanard,  afterwards  a  promi 
nent  lawyer  and  State  senator.  She  died  April, 
1824,  in  her  thirty-first  year.  The  sentimental 
tourist  may  see  her  birthplace — an  old  frame 
house  with  dormer  windows — still  standing  in 
Nineteenth  Street,  and  find,  facing  the  Capitol 
Square  in  Ninth  Street,  the  modest  house  where 
Poe  knew  her  and  made  her  his  confidante  and 
idol. 

Perhaps  the  most  touching  and  impressive 
shrine  that  remains  to  us  in  Richmond  is 
120 


"Helen's"  Home  and  Grave 

"  Helen's"  grave.  We  find  it  among  many 
mouldering  mounds  in  the  cemetery  on  Shockoe 
Hill,  at  the  northern  verge  of  the  city,  in  a 
neighborhood  now  pathetically  poor  and  un 
attractive.  An  upright  altar-stone,  inscribed 
with  a  tender  record  of  her  virtues  and  charms 
and  of  her  husband's  grief  at  her  loss,  marks  the 
place  of  her  sepulchre.  Here  the  bereft  boy 
Poe  stood  by  her  "  drear  and  rigid  bier"  and  saw 
her  beloved  form  committed  to  the  lap  of  earth, 
and  here,  night  after  night,  in  darkness  and 
storm,  he  lay  upon  her  grave  calling  to  this 
angel  of  his  darkened  nature  and  striving  by  his 
presence  to  solace  her  loneliness  and  gloom. 

Years  after  his  expulsion  from  his  early  home, 
Poe  returned  to  Richmond,  from  Baltimore,  to 
assist  in  editing  the  Southern  Literary  Messenger : 
the  site  of  the  house  of  Mrs.  Yarrington,  where 
he  then  boarded,  where  he  was  the  second  time 
married  to  his  lovely  child-cousin,  and  where  he 
wrote  the  spectral  tale  of  "  Berenice"  and  a  part 
of  the  "  Narrative  of  Arthur  Gordon  Pym,  of 
Nantucket,"  is — according  to  Mr.  Traylor — now 
covered  by  the  stables  of  the  Exchange  Hotel  in 
Franklin  Street. 

The  poet's  last  visit  to  Richmond  is  still  re 
membered  by  some  who  then  knew  him  here 
and  witnessed  his  brave  effort  to  release  himself 

121 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

from  the  thraldom  of  appetite.  The  historic 
old  inn  where  he  lodged,  a  long,  low,  hip-roofed 
edifice  of  Broad  Street,  still  stands  in  the  last 
stage  of  dilapidation,  and  was  recently  a  negro 
boarding-house;  the  public  hall  in  which  he 
delivered  his  last  lecture  and  recited  the  weird 
"  Raven"  to  a  spell-bound  audience  exists  now 
as  a  police  court.  The  dwelling  where  he 
courted  anew  the  sweetheart  of  his  boyhood 
may  yet  be  seen ;  it  is  a  substantial  red  brick 
domicile  of  moderate  size  standing  upon  the 
acclivity  of  Church  Hill,  and  the  rooms  in 
which  he  wooed — perhaps  more  for  the  sake  of 
the  ideal  Stylus  than  for  his  own — the  wealthy 
widow  Shelton  remain  essentially  unchanged. 
Less  happy  has  been  the  fate  of  Duncan  Lodge, 
the  once  beautiful  suburban  residence  of  the 
Mackenzies.  Poe's  sister  was  a  member  of  this 
household,  and  in  their  luxurious  seat  he  spent 
much  of  this,  his  last  summer ;  here  he  was 
tenderly  nursed  through  a  periodic  attack  which 
seriously  menaced  his  life  and  foreshadowed  the 
fatal  result  of  another  relapse;  here  he  passed 
the  last  night  of  his  stay  in  Richmond  and  "  sat 
late  at  his  window  meditatively  smoking,"  as  one 
friend  remembers.  The  Lodge  stands  a  mile 
westward  from  the  place  of  the  poet's  lodgings, 
but  the  then  shady  and  fashionable  drive  by 

122 


Richmond,  Poe's  Last  Visit 

which  he  approached  it  is  now  but  a  bare  and 
sunny  highway,  and  the  spacious  old  brick  man 
sion  has  been  walled  in,  and,  after  long  use  as  a 
private  asylum,  it  became  a  vagrants*  workhouse. 
A  furlong  distant,  embowered  by  trees  and 
environed  by  ample  grounds,  was  the  delightful 
home  in  which  he  passed  many  happy  hours 
with  the  poet  Susan  Archer  Talley  (now  Mrs. 
Weiss)  during  his  last  months  of  life.  It  was 
with  her  here  that  he  spent  the  evening  of  the 
day  before  he  set  out  upon  the  disastrous  journey 
which  was  to  end  so  soon  at  Baltimore,  unfold 
ing  to  her  his  plans  for  the  near  future,  and 
"  seeming,"  as  she  says,  "  to  anticipate  it  with 
an  eager  delight  like  that  of  youth."  Here 
flower  and  shrub  and  sward  have  long  vanished, 
the  pleasant  gardens  were  destroyed  in  the  con 
struction  of  martial  ramparts,  the  great  trees  be 
neath  which  he  strolled  and  the  arbors  where  he 
tarried  in  poetic  converse  with  his  friend  were 
swept  away  to  clear  a  range  for  artillery,  and 
the  house,  despoiled  of  its  ample  dimensions 
and  shorn  of  its  wide  verandas,  stands  isolated 
and  treeless  in  the  midst  of  its  bare  acres. 

The  track  of  Poe's  final  and  fateful  journey 
leads  us  to  Baltimore  and  to  unfamiliar  scenes  of 
his  struggles  and  of  his  life's  ultimate  disaster. 
123 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

In  Eastern  Avenue  we  find  the  place  of  the  poor 
home  into  which  Mrs.  Clemm  received  him  in 
his  young  manhood,  after  he  had  been  expelled 
from  the  Military  Academy  and  cast  off  by  his 
foster-father  with  no  inheritance  but  reckless 
waywardness  and  luxurious  habits.  The  hum 
ble  rooms — "  always  as  neat  as  wax,"  a  neighbor 
said — were  in  the  upper  portion  of  a  plain  two- 
storied  dwelling,  where  the  widow  had,  for  a 
year  or  two,  supported  by  her  industry  herself 
and  her  child  Virginia.  The  back  attic-room 
was  Poe's  chamber,  and  here  he  wrote  poems 
and  tales  which  yielded  neither  fame  nor  more- 
needed  money.  Here  his  windows  overlooked 
those  of  the  fair"  Mary/'  afterwards  hisjiancee, 
to  whom  some  of  his  stanzas  of  the  time  were 
addressed,  and  his  acquaintance  with  her  began 
with  throwing  kisses  across  the  intervening  back 
yards  and  transmitting  messages  to  her  by  his 
little  cousin.  "  Mary's"  home,  a  simple  dwell 
ing  standing  just  around  the  nearest  corner  from 
his  own,  was  for  months  his  evening  haunt,  and 
the  little  square  porch  at  the  door,  where  the 
lovers  sometimes  sat  late  in  the  moonlight,  was 
the  scene  of  their  final  quarrel  and  separation. 
Once  the  poet,  in  torn  attire  and  followed  by  a 
rabble  of  boys,  came  to  this  house  and  threw  at 
"  Mary's"  feet  the  whip  with  which  he  had 
124 


Baltimore  Scenes 

just  lashed  her  uncle  for  some  reproof  of  his 
conduct. 

A  year  or  so  later  an  unpretentious  tenement 
in  Amity  Street  near  Lexington  was  Poe's  lowly 
abode  during  a  period  when  his  poverty  was  so 
pressing  that  he  was  obliged  to  decline  invita 
tions  for  want  of  proper  apparel  in  which  to 
appear.  Here  he  produced  "  The  Coliseum" 
and  other  poems  and  revised  the  thrilling  tale  of 
the  "  MS.  found  in  a  Bottle,"  whose  publication 
procured  for  him  the  friendship  and  assistance 
of  John  P.  Kennedy, — the  "  gentle  Horseshoe" 
of  Irving's  letters  and  author  of  "  Swallow  Barn," 
etc.,  who  early  abandoned  literature  for  politics. 
Here,  too,  it  is  said,  Poe  was  secretly  married  to 
Virginia,  the  lovely  "  Eleanora"  of  his  rythmical 
prose  tale  of  the  "  Valley  of  the  Many-Colored 
Grass,"  and  hence  he  removed  to  Richmond 
when  Mr.  Kennedy  had  found  occupation  for 
him  there  upon  the  Literary  Messenger. 

The  place  of  the  wretched  crib  where  began, 
after  his  arrival  from  Richmond,  the  final  tragedy 
of  the  poet's  life,  and  whence,  comatose  and  un 
conscious,  he  was  removed  only  to  die,  is  still 
pointed  out  in  one  of  the  older  wards  of  the 
city.  The  tragedy  was  ended  in  the  hospital  on 
Broadway.  It  is  an  imposing  edifice,  standing 
in  pleasantly  shaded  grounds  at  the  corner  of 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

Hampstead  Street :  we  find  it  now  converted 
into  a  Church  Home  for  invalids,  but  Poe's 
room  upon  the  third  floor  is  unchanged,  and  we 
may  see  the  very  spot  where,  at  dawn  of  an 
October  sabbath,  the  great  silence  fell  upon  this 
child  of  genius  and  for  him 

"  The  fever  called  living 
Was  conquered  at  last.' 

In  this  spot  his  spirit  lingered  for  days  ere  it 
crossed  into  the  mystic  realm  ;  through  this  north 
window  his  unheeding  eyes  last  looked  upon  the 
light ;  these  walls  echoed  his  last  desponding 
utterance  ;  through  this  door  and  along  yonder 
passage  his  wasted  body  was  borne  for  burial. 

Near  by,  upon  the  same  floor,  is  the  room 
which  his  devoted  mother,  Mrs.  Clemm,  long 
occupied,  and  where,  twenty-two  years  after  his 
death,  she,  too,  passed  away  to  be  buried  by  his 
side.  In  this  apartment  she  devoutly  cherished 
many  mementos  of  the  poet  and  his  wife,  which 
have  since  found  sympathetic  ownership,  and 
during  the  slow-moving  years  she  failed  not  to 
visit  almost  daily  the  room  where  her  "  Eddie" 
died.  The  present  occupant  of  the  chamber 
was  an  interne  during  some  years  of  Mrs. 
Clemm's  abode  here,  and  was  with  her  at  her 
death. 

126 


Where  Poe  Died — Grave 

A  remote  corner  of  the  church-yard  at  Fayette 
and  Green  Streets,  a  mile  or  so  distant,  was  the 
place  of  the  poet's  interment.  At  the  close  of 
the  day  following  his  death,  a  sad  company  of 
five  persons  here  consigned  his  mortal  part  to 
earth,  and,  his  tombstone  having  been  acci 
dentally  shattered,  he  slept  in  an  unmarked  and 
neglected  grave  for  twenty-six  years  and  then 
was  reinterred,  with  his  wife  and  Mrs.  Clemm, 
near  the  street.  His  final  resting-place  is  marked 
by  a  memorial  stone  which  was  erected  by  the 
exertions  of  the  teachers  of  the  Baltimore  schools, 
and  was  dedicated  in  the  presence  of  Walt  Whit 
man  and  other  poets  and  authors,  as  well  as  Poe's 
Baltimore  relatives,  his  old  teacher,  and  one  of 
his  biographers.  It  is  a  low,  square  monument 
of  white  marble ;  one  polished  panel  bears  a 
medalion  portrait  of  the  poet,  another  is  inscribed 
with  his  years,  and  above  each  is  sculptured  a 
laurel-decked  lyre.  When  we  last  visited  the 
spot  an  ivied  effigy  of  a  raven,  placed  by  loving 
hands,  rested  upon  the  grasses  of  the  grave. 

The  environment  is  pathetically  inappropriate 
and  rudely  mars  the  associations  which  should 
hallow  the  tomb  of  this  bard  of  the  lofty 
minstrelsy.  The  shadow  and  silence  he  loved 
in  life  are  wholly  wanting  in  this  spot,  noisy 
streets  closely  invest  it,  and  the  tumult  of  traffic 
127 


Homes  and  Haunts  of  Poe 

and  the  incessant  clangor  of  trolley  lines  disturb 
and  dispel  the  musings  his  grave  might  well  in 
spire  ;  yet  amid  the  din  and  clamor  his  restless 
ness  rests, — here  at  last  he  knows  the  peace 
which  Tennyson  craved  for  him  in  the  epitaph 
not  yet  graven  upon  his  stone,  while 

"  fate  that  once  denied  him, 
And  envy  that  decried  him, 
And  malice  that  belied  him, 
Now  cenotaph  his  fame." 


128 


BRYANT,  WHITMAN,  ETC.;   A 
LONG  ISLAND  RAMBLE 

Brooklyn  Shrines— Greenwood  Literary  Graves— Whitman  at 
Whitestone— Bryanf  s  Cedarmere— Roslyn— Bryant*  s  Tomb- 
Birthplace  of  Whitman— Whitman  and  Huntington—The 
Oldest  Living  Poet— Julian  Hawthorne— Scenes  of  "Home, 
Sweet  Home'*— Where  Margaret  Fuller  perished. 

T  ONG  ISLAND,  famous  as  a  fruitful  field 
-•— '  for  the  artist  and  the  sportsman,  will  be 
found  no  less  rich  in  those  associations  which 
are  the  delight  and  the  reward  of  the  literary 
rambler.  This,  the  "  fish-shape  Paumanok"  of 
one  of  its  bards,  has  long  been  celebrated  in 
romance  and  song,  as  well  as  in  the  more  sedate 
pages  of  history,  and,  as  we  trace  its  picturesque 
expanse,  we  may  find  many  scenes  linked  with 
the  lives  or  preserved  in  the  books  of  American 
authors  of  every  generation  from  the  time  of 
the  pioneers  to  the  present. 

Its  chief  city,  Whitman's  "  Brooklyn,  of 
ample  hills,"  has  held  the  homes  of  some  of 
these, — of  Beecher,  the  author-divine,  on  Co 
lumbia  Heights ;  of  Saxe,  the  American  Hood, 
in  First  Place  ;  of  the  poets  Stoddard  and  Tay 
lor,  in  Douglass  Street,  and  of  many  besides, — 
and  is  still  the  abode  of  others  of  greater  or 
lesser  fame.  A  plain,  three-storied,  brownstone 
9  I29 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

house  in  Greene  Avenue  is  the  delightful  home 
of  Will  Carleton,  poet  of  "  Farm  Ballads,"  who 
here  wrote  his  «•  City"  series,  "  Rhymes  of  Our 
Planet,"  etc.  In  a  spacious,  old-fashioned  man 
sion  on  Clark  Street  lives  the  historian  and 
novelist  Paul  Leicester  Ford :  a  large  square 
apartment  built  over  the  yard  contains  his 
library,  with  its  famous  collection  of  Ameri 
cana,  and  here  much  of  his  best  work  has  been 
accomplished,  including  his  most  popular  book, 
"  The  Honorable  Peter  Stirling,"  which  was 
suggested  by  the  author's  personal  experiences 
in  city  politics.  The  old  carpenter-shop  of 
Walt  Whitman  has  disappeared  from  Cumber 
land  Street,  but  we  may  still  find  the  room,  on 
the  upper  floor  of  the  building  No.  98  Cran 
berry  Street,  where  he  helped  to  set  the  type 
for  his  "  Leaves  of  Grass,"  and  the  store  at  No. 
no  Myrtle  Avenue  which  he  built  and  in 
which  he  sold  books  and  published  his  little 
periodical.  Just  out  of  Myrtle  Avenue,  in 
Portland,  stands  unchanged  the  simple,  three- 
storied  brick  house  which  was  his  home  when 
his  first  volume  was  written,  and  the  city  has 
now  grown  far  beyond  the  later  dwelling — then 
the  farthest  house  upon  the  farthest  street — 
where  he  lived  with  his  mother  when  Conway 
visited  him.  An  unpretentious  brick  house  in 
130 


Carleton— Whitman— "  Stella" 

Dean  Street  was  for  years  the  home  of  Sarah 
Anna  Lewis,  the  "  Stella"  of  three  or  four 
volumes  of  verse,  who  was  extravagantly  lauded 
by  Poe,  Lamartine,  and  others  as  the  "  rival 
of  Sappho,"  "  the  female  Petrarch,"  etc.  She 
it  was  whom  Bayard  Taylor  burlesqued  in  the 
"Adeliza  Choate"  of  his  "John  Godfrey's 
Fortunes."  In  the  parlors  of  this  plain  little 
dwelling  were  held  brilliant  literary  receptions 
which  were  attended  by  some  of  the  most  emi 
nent  writers  of  the  time.  It  is  said  that  at  one 
of  these  seances  Poe  read  "  The  Raven"  from 
the  manuscript  before  it  had  been  given  to  the 
public.  He  made  the  hostess  the  heroine  of 
his  sonnet  "Seldom  we  Find;"  in  her  home  he 
was  a  frequent  visitor ;  here  he  passed  his  last 
night  before  setting  out  upon  the  calamitous 
southern  journey,  and  took  leave  of  his  friend 
with  avowed  foreboding  that  he  would  never 
see  her  again. 

We  find  "  Stella's"  grave  a  mile  or  two  dis 
tant  from  her  sometime  home,  on  an  embowered 
path  of  Greenwood,  Brooklyn's  beautiful  necrop 
olis.  The  spot,  not  far  from  the  border  of  the  en 
closure,  was  chosen  by  herself,  and  is  marked  by 
a  block  of  granite  which  is  now  slowly  moulder 
ing,  while  the  rank  growth  of  coarse  grasses 
above  her  grave  shows  how  entirely  it  is  neg- 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

lected  and  forgotten.  Amid  the  diverse  beauties 
of  foliage  and  flower  that  clothe  the  populous 
slopes  of  the  cemetery,  in  the  shade  of  whisper 
ing  trees  and  beneath  mossy  marbles  that  tell  of 
eternal  hope,  lie  others  of  our  literati  wrapt  in 
the  great  silence.  Here  are  the  graves  of  Greeley, 
Beecher,  Dr.  Francis ;  at  the  foot  of  a  granite 
memorial,  on  a  grassy  slope  near  the  entrance, 
the  sweet  poet-sisters,  Alice  and  Phoebe  Gary, 
lie — as  they  lived — side  by  side,  consigned  to 
earth  by  the  loving  hands  of  Parton,  Taylor, 
Greeley,  Frothingham,  William  Ross  Wallace, 
and  other  literary  friends  and  associates.  The 
once  blithesome  John  G.  Saxe  sleeps  in  a  beau 
tiful  spot  distinguished  by  a  tall  obelisk,  among 
the  graves  of  the  loved  ones  whose  rapid  deaths 
induced  the  fateful  melancholy  of  his  later  years. 
In  a  dismal  subterrane  of  the  arbored  Walnut 
Hill  the  mortal  part  of  Irving's  friend  and 
literary  associate,  James  K.  Paulding,  poet  of 
"  The  Backwoodsman"  and  author  of  twenty- 
seven  once  popular  volumes,  has  lain  for  forty 
years. 

A  knoll  overlooking  the  lakelet  of  "  Sylvan 
Water,"  and  shaded  by  great  oaks,  is  crowned 
by  the  obelisk  which  marks  the  tomb  of  poor 
McDonald  Clarke,  the  "  Mad  Poet  of  Broad 
way,"  friend  of  Halleck  and  hero  of  his  "  Dis- 
132 


Literary  Graves  of  Greenwood 

carded."  The  modest  monument  bears  a  sculp 
tured  medallion  of  the  eccentric  bard,  with  an 
epitaph  composed  by  himself  and  some  pathetic 
lines  of  his  verse.  Near  the  Myrtle  Avenue 
is  the  last  resting-place  of  the  brilliant  and  versa 
tile  author  and  poet,  Fitzjames  O'Brien, — writer 
of  the  strange  and  fanciful  tale  of"  The  Diamond 
Lens," — who  was  caricatured  by  North  in  his 
"  Slave  of  the  Lamp ;"  the  spot,  apparently 
unvisited  and  unregarded,  is  indicated  by  a 
simple  marble  set  in  the  sward  and  graven  only 
with  his  name.  In  other  portions  of  the 
cemetery  are  the  now  neglected  graves  of  Ann 
S.  Stephens  and  the  once  famous  "  Doesticks" 
(Mortimer  Thompson),  and,  among  the  tombs 
of  the  thousands  of  nameless  dead  who  He  in 
dolorous  rows  upon  the  "  Hill  of  Graves,"  we 
find  the  sunken  and  unheeded  sepulchre  of  the 
once  queenly  and  brilliant  Mary  Ann  Duff,  one 
of  the  great  beauties  and  actresses  of  her  day 
and  the  first  sweetheart  of  the  poet  Thomas 
Moore.  She  was  the  "  Mary"  of  his  verse, 
whom  he  vainly  wooed  to  be  his  wife ;  to  her 
were  addressed  the  lines  beginning,  "  Mary,  I 
believed  thee  true"  and  "  While  gazing  on  the 
moon's  light,"  with  others  of  his  beautiful  love 
lyrics.  From  the  heights  that  swell  above  the 
graves  of  these  our  dead,  we  look  abroad  upon 
133 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

a  prospect  which  once  delighted  them  and  see 
great  areas  of  the  metropolis  with  its  spires  and 
spars  and  its  stir  and  stress  of  busy  life,  the 
shimmering  water-ways  with  their  myriad  craft, 
the  verdure  of  farther  wooded  hills,  the  bound 
less  ocean  rippling  in  eternal  unrest :  while  we 
linger  and  gaze  all  the  scene  is  glorified  by  a 
flood  of  golden  light  from  the  western  sky, 
which  slowly  fades  as  the  sun  sinks  behind  the 
steeps  of  distant  Watchung  and  the  boom  of 
the  evening  gun  comes  to  us  across  the  bay. 

Beyond  Greenwood  lies  the  Bay  Ridge  of 
Aldrich's  sonnet,  and  among  the  northern  de 
pendencies  of  Brooklyn  are  Ravenswood,  where, 
in  the  summer  home  of  Hoffman,  Irving  finally 
prepared  for  publication  Knickerbocker's  won 
derful  "History  of  New  York,"  and  Astoria, 
where  Cooper  sometime  dwelt  and  wrote  "  The 
Last  of  the  Mohicans."  Eastward  from  these 
stretches  the  picturesque  North  Shore,  with  its 
beautiful  headlands  and  inlets,  where  Bryant  and 
Whitman  sometimes  walked  in  summer  days,  be 
fore  the  publication  of  "  Enfans  d'Adam"  had 
finally  estranged  them,  and  where  "  glorious 
saunters"  like  theirs  bring  us  to  scenes  they  loved. 

Here,  too,  we  find  Flushing,  where,  at  the 
age  of  twelve,  the  poet  Richard  Watson  Gil- 
134 


Where  Whitman  Taught 

der  began  his  editorial  career,  and  where  now 
dwell  the  grandchildren  of  Saxe's  household ; 
the  Prospect  Hill  home  of  the  "  Poet  Lariat" 
of  Mark  Twain's  "  Innocents  Abroad,"  and 
scenes  of  Whitman's  early  life  and  labors.  At 
Whitestone,  in  the  basement  of  an  old  building 
which  has  since  been  used  as  a  Catholic  church 
and  is  soon  to  be  replaced  by  a  larger  edifice, 
the  future  poet  of  democracy  began  the  career 
in  pedagogy  to  which  he  incidentally  owed  his 
"  deepest  lessons  in  human  nature  behind  the 
scenes  and  in  the  masses."  A  mile  distant  we 
see  the  simple  dwelling  in  which  he  boarded 
and  the  plain  little  room  he  occupied,  essentially 
unchanged.  He  is  well  remembered  by  some  of 
his  quondam  pupils  and  by  surviving  members 
of  the  family  with  whom  he  lived,  who  pleas 
antly  recall  his  genial  manners,  his  aptness  as  a 
story-teller,  his  hearty  participation  in  the  games 
of  the  children  at  the  noon  recess,  his  thorough 
and  unusual  modes  of  teaching  and  discipline. 
A  brace  of  boys  who  lived  opposite  to  Whitman's 
boarding-place  recollect  now,  as  septuagenaries, 
delightful  walks  with  him  on  the  way  to  school 
along  a  woodland  way  which  afforded  many 
topics  for  lively  talks  upon  natural  history.  It 
is  further  remembered  here  that  he  preferred 
the  Old  Testament  to  the  New,  dressed  rather 
US 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

carefully  in  the  conventional  garb,  avoided  young 
ladies,  wore  no  beard,  and  wrote  poetry  which 
was  signed  "  Walter  Whitman."  Of  the  several 
poems  said  to  have  been  composed  here,  diligent 
inquiry  fails  to  discover  more  than  a  few  lines 
of  a  single  poem  of  seven  stanzas,  the  manu 
script  of  which  one  of  his  pupils  saw  in  Whit 
man's  handwriting,  and  these  lines  follow  the 
accepted  models  of  verse  and  give  no  promise  of 
the  daring  and  power  of  his  later  productions. 

Farther  eastward,  overlooking  the  Sound  near 
the  entrance  to  Hempstead  Harbor,  is  Dosoris, 
the  luxurious  island  home  in  which  the  late 
Charles  A.  Dana  spent  much  of  each  year  among 
his  books  and  treasures  of  art,  and  along  the 
embowered  slopes  which  border  the  inland 
reaches  of  the  Harbor  lies  Cedarmere,  which 
was  for  thirty-five  years  the  abode  of  the  poet 
of  "  Thanatopsis,"  and  is  indissolubly  allied  with 
his  name.  The  ample  acres  of  the  estate  fall 
away  from  wooded  summits  to  the  shore  in 
picturesque  slopes,  and  upon  one  of  these — in  a 
spot  which  Bryant  thought  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  in  the  world — stands  the  generous,  old- 
fashioned  mansion,  unaltered  since  he  abode 
beneath  its  roof-tree.  It  is  a  handsome  and 
substantial  square  fabric  of  wood,  whose  mas 
sive  hewn  timbers  have  stood  above  a  century ; 
136 


Beautiful  Cedarmere 

wide  verandas,  with  lattices  garlanded  by  cling 
ing  vines,  encompass  it  ;  deep  bay-windows 
project  from  either  side ;  pretty  dormers  pierce 
the  gambrel  roofs,  and  the  whole  edifice  is  shaded 
and  shielded  by  giant  trees  that  closely  environ  it. 
A  spacious  hall,  with  ancient  stairway  and  with 
quaintly  divided  Dutch  doors  at  either  end,  ex 
tends  through  the  centre  of  the  house ;  on  its 
right  is  the  pleasant  dining-room,  still  set  forth 
with  the  poet's  pictures  and  furniture,  where  on 
Sabbath  mornings  he  read  prayers  and  a  chapter 
of  ancient  scripture  for  the  assembled  house 
hold.  Opposite  is  the  parlor,  with  its  many 
priceless  mementos  and  belongings  of  the  great 
genius  of  this  place,  and  its  memories  of  his  ten 
der  home-life  here,  as  well  as  of  social  pleasures 
which  have  been  shared  by  some  of  the  best 
and  foremost  in  letters  and  art.  An  ample  fire 
place,  with  quaint  tiles  and  antique  stone  hearth, 
is  against  one  side-wall  ;  other  walls  are  recessed 
by  large  bay-windows  which  reveal  exquisite 
vistas  of  garden  and  inlet ;  rich  and  curious 
souvenirs  and  articles  of  furniture  are  artistically 
disposed  through  the  room,  and  these,  together 
with  its  associations,  render  it  one  of  the  most 
pleasing  and  memorable  of  apartments.  Upon 
the  floor  above  is  the  place  of  the  bard's  "  mon 
key-shines,"  as  he  called  the  early  morning  calis- 
137 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

thenlcs  which  helped  to  maintain  his  healthful 
vigor,  and  near  at  hand  is  the  chamber  in  which 
the  sympathetic  and  inspiring  companion  of  his 
life  and  its  chief  stay  and  blessing  sank  in  mortal 
illness.  But,  for  the  literary  pilgrim,  the  poet's 
library — the  sanctuary  to  which  he  retired  when 
he  "  donned  his  singing  robes" — will  have  the 
most  potent  and  tender  charm.  It  is  a  room  of 
generous  dimensious  just  back  of  the  parlor, 
lighted  by  twin  bay-windows,  one  of  which 
looks  down  a  flowering  slope  to  the  water,  while 
the  other  commands  a  reach  of  verdant  turf 
where  Bryant's  favorite  magnolia  has  been  re 
placed  by  another  of  younger  growth.  The 
quaint  fireplace,  adorned  by  old  Dutch  tiles  with 
scriptural  references,  is  upon  the  south  side  of 
the  room  ;  in  front  of  the  hearth  stood,  in  the 
poet's  day,  a  large  table  strewn  with  books  and 
periodicals ;  this,  as  well  as  his  smaller  writing- 
table,  has  been  removed  by  his  daughter,  but  his 
shelves  still  cover  the  walls  and  hold  hundreds 
of  his  books.  Here  Bryant  devoted  the  morn 
ings  to  his  beloved  literary  occupations,  fashion 
ing  exalted  thought  and  fancy  into  words  and 
recording  them  with  a  quill  pen  which  he 
mended  with  a  knife  Bigelow  thought  nearly  as 
old  as  himself.  This  apartment  was  a  haunt 
sacred  to  his  muse  and  to  purely  literary  pur- 
138 


Bryant's  Home  and  Study 

suits ;  into  it  no  task  of  daily  journalism  was 
allowed  to  intrude  ;  here  he  produced  many  of 
his  shorter  poems  ;  here,  "  wearing  his  crown 
of  years,"  he  sought  in  distracting  occupation 
relief  from  the  great  sorrow  of  his  wife's  death 
and  executed  the  most  of  the  wonderful  transla 
tion  of  Homer's  epics,  working  the  harder  as 
the  fear  grew  in  his  mind  that  his  own  death 
might  leave  the  task  unfinished ;  here,  in  the  last 
days,  he  completed  the  Mazzini  oration,  his  final 
utterance,  whose  public  delivery  was  almost  the 
latest  sentient  act  of  his  life. 

The  abounding  beauties  Bryant  created  in  the 
grounds  about  his  home  are  sedulously  pre 
served  :  on  every  side  are  great  trees  he  knew 
and  tended  and  some  of  which  he  planted  with 
his  own  hands,  masses  of  ornamental  shrubbery 
dot  the  turf  of  the  lawn,  and  the  garden  par 
terres  he  cultivated  are  yet  aglow  with  the  bright- 
hued  flowers  he  loved.  At  the  foot  of  his 
garden  we  see,  on  one  hand,  the  rippling  bay 
with  its  scudding  sails  and  farther  shore  of 
sunset  hills ;  on  another  side  the  velvet  sward 
declines  to  a  pretty  lakelet,  fed  by  hill-side  springs 
and  held  by  a  dike  picturesquely  planted  with 
trees  and  shrubs.  A  rustic  bridge  spans  this 
water  where  the  poet  rowed  in  his  daughter's 
boat,  foliage  and  flowers  overhang  and  trail  in  it, 
139 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

and,  at  one  shady  spot,  a  laughing  cascade  tum 
bles  out  of  it  down  a  declivity  where  spring  the 
white  violets  that  refused  to  grow  for  the  poet 
about  the  place  of  his  grave.  Nearer  the  brow 
of  the  hill  are  remnants  of  the  fruit-trees  of  his 

poem, — 

"  That  springtime  burst 
Into  such  breadth  of  bloom," 

and  near  which  he  yearly  gathered  upon  the 
green  the  children  of  the  neighborhood  for  a 
festival  of  fruit. 

The  tasteful  houses  Bryant  erected  near  his 
own — one  of  which  was  long  occupied  by  his 
son-in-law,  Mr.  Parke  Godwin,  and  another 
by  Mrs.  Kirkland,  who  here  wrote  some  of  her 
vivacious  western  sketches — still  stand  to  be 
summer  homes  for  his  kindred.  Upon  the 
adjacent  historic  "  Mudge  place,"  which  he 
added  to  his  lands,  his  favorite  tree — a  magnifi 
cent  walnut  twenty-six  feet  in  circumference  and 
nearly  two  centuries  old,  of  which  he  talked 
with  General  Wilson  but  a  few  minutes  before 
the  accident  that  caused  the  poet's  death — yet 
"  drops  its  heavy  fruit"  as  in  the  time  when  he 
celebrated  it  in  his  verse.  Woodland  hills  rise 
above  and  beyond  the  mansion,  and  paths  the 
poet  planned  lead  to  summits  whence  we  see  a 
charming  panorama  of  undulating  hills  and  dis- 
140 


The  Poet's  Garden  and  Grounds 

tant  stretches  of  the  Sound  enlivened  with  ever- 
moving  sails. 

Bryant  acquired  this  lovely  retirement  in 
middle  life ;  his  cultured  taste  transformed  the 
severely  plain  old  Quaker  dwelling  of  his  pred 
ecessor  and  added  myriad  graces  of  vine  and 
bough  and  bloom  to  the  natural  charms  of  the 
spot,  and  thenceforth  it  became  his  best-beloved 
home.  To  its  restful  shades  he  came  early  in 
the  springtime,  here  he  lingered  late  in  the 
autumns  of  his  happiest  years,  as  well  as  in  the 
quiet  of  the  later  time  when  life  was  "Journey 
ing,  in  long  serenity,  away,"  as  he  had  forewished 
in  his  "  October"  sonnet,  and  from  this  place  he 
went  forth  to  the  duties  of  his  last  day.  Here 
he  entertained  Halleck,  Stoddard,  Dana,  Cobden, 
Hackett,  Forrest,  Durand,  Hicks,  Lord  Hough- 
ton,  Catherine  Sedgwick,  Ida  Pfeiffer,  and  many 
eminent  in  letters  and  art  who  came  from  both 
sides  of  the  sea  with  their  tribute  of  respect  to 
the  author  and  sage.  This  homestead  was  be 
queathed  to  Bryant's  unmarried  daughter,  and 
ownership  has  since  passed  to  his  grandson,  Mr. 
Harold  Godwin,  of  Current  Literature,  who 
sympathetically  cherishes  and  preserves  its  pre 
cious  souvenirs  and  associations. 

Some  furlongs  distant  the  picturesque  village 
the  poet  named  Roslyn  reposes  among  overhang- 
Hi 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

ing  hills,  and  here  we  yet  find  those  who  grate 
fully  remember  his  holiday  donations.  Here  is 
the  spacious  library  and  reading-room,  with  its 
fine  collection  of  books,  the  gift  of  Bryant  to  his 
neighbors,  and  near  it  is  the  school — recently 
rebuilt — where  sometime  taught  his  manager, 
Cline,  and  for  which  he  provided  the  prayer- 
books.  Farther  along  the  straggling  street  we 
find  the  quaint,  sober-hued,  little  hill-side  church 
where  Bryant  was  for  many  years  a  regular 
attendant  and  of  which  he  was  a  trustee  and  a 
generous  supporter.  Near  the  middle  window 
on  the  right  side  is  his  long-used  pew,  preserved 
unchanged  since  he  worshipped  here  on  his  last 
conscious  Sabbath,  now  held  by  his  daughter  and 
often  occupied  by  his  grandchildren.  Here  his 
friend  Dr.  Dewey  sometimes  preached  during 
visits  at  Cedarmere,  being  playfully  invited  by 
Bryant  to  "  bring  a  sermon  or  two  in  your  pocket, 
— of  your  second  or  third  quality,  for  we  are 
plain  people  and  anything  very  fine  is  wasted 
upon  us,"  and  here  is  now  annually  held  a  ser 
vice  commemorative  of  the  poet. 

A  mile  beyond  the  village  a  rural  cemetery, 
which  Bryant  assisted  to  establish,  lies  upon  a 
green  hill-side  overlooking  the  distant  water  and 
a  pleasing  prospect  of  the  forests  and  fields  he 
knew  so  well.  A  beautiful  spot  which  declines 
142 


Bryant's  Grave 

towards  the  setting  sun  was  prepared  by  him  for 
his  burial-place  and  that  of  his  household  :  a 
hedge  of  evergreen  encloses  it  and  trees  he 
rooted  sway  in  the  summer  wind  and  throw  soft 
shadows  upon  the  turf  above  the  mounds.  Here 
sleep  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Godwin,  and  some  of 
her  children,  and  nearer  the  foot  of  the  slope  is 
the  grave  where  the  poet  laid  his  wife  and  which 
he  weekly  strewed  with  flowers  gathered  from 
his  garden  at  Cedarmere.  By  her  sepulchre  he 
erected  a  tall  shaft  of  granite,  upon  which  he 
inscribed  a  loving  tribute  to  her  virtues :  the 
same  stone  bears  now  his  own  name,  with  the 
simple  record  of  his  years,  and  the  aged  minstrel 
rests  in  the  grassy  mound  by  her  side,  where, 
beneath  a  wealth  of  blossoms,  he  was  placed  one 
day  of  "  flowery  June," — as  he  had  desired  in 
his  verse, — and  left  to  sleep  amid 

"  Soft  airs,  and  song,  and  light,  and  bloom." 

Faring  through  farther  landscapes  of  this 
romantic  north  shore,  we  find  again  the  foot 
steps  of  Whitman.  From  Huntington  and  the 
scene  of  his  "  Tomb  Blossoms"  a  stroll  beneath 
a  sapphire  sky  and  along  a  way  bordered  and 
shaded  by  wild,  bird-haunted  hedge-rows  brings 
us  to  the  place  of  his  birth.  It  is  a  plain,  two- 
storied,  wooden  farm-house  with  sloping  roofs, 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

its  sides  covered  with  weather-worn  shingles,  its 
entrance  sheltered  by  a  little  square  porch  and 
shadowed  by  old-fashioned  flowering  shrubs. 
Ample,  low-studded  apartments  are  disposed 
upon  either  side  of  a  central  hall,  at  the  right 
the  living-room,  at  the  left  a  prim  parlor,  and 
behind  this — its  window  looking  out  upon  the 
fields  his  father  tilled — the  humble  room  in 
which  the  future  "  Good,  Gray  Poet"  first  saw 
the  light.  The  house  stands  in  the  midst  of  the 
hundreds  of  acres — all  now  "  passed  into  alien 
blood" — the  Whitmans  here  held  for  two  cen 
turies,  upon  another  portion  of  which  we  find 
the  remains  of  the  mighty-timbered  structure 
which  was  their  primitive  dwelling.  Near  by 
still  stands  the  stately  grove  of  *«  Apollo-like" 
walnut-trees  and  towers  the  "  big  oak"  of  the 
bard's  loving  remembrance.  Upon  an  outlying 
slope  of  the  near  hills  is  the  neglected  family 
burial-place  where  many  generations  of  his 
ancestors  rest  from  the  labors  of  life.  Strag 
gling  trees  grow  about,  weeds  and  coarse  grasses 
spring  from  the  sterile  soil,  and  ground-nesting 
birds  build  between  the  mouldering  heaps.  A 
score  of  the  graves  are  marked  by  rude  stones, 
softened  and  lichened  by  time,  but  many  more 
lack  even  these  poor  memorials  to  show  that,  in 
the  narrow  cells  beneath,  mortals  wait  for  resur- 
144 


Whitn 

h  weathc 

porch  and 

g    shrubs. 

are    disposed 

J    hall,  at  the  right 

n  the 

fields    his    fath  room  in 

M  the  future  "  "  first  saw 

the  light.     The  house  si 
hundreds  of  acres — all  now  "pa 
blood" — the  Whitmans  here  held  for  two  cen 
turies,  upon  another  portion  of  which  we  find 
the  remains  of  the    mighty-timbered    structure 
which  was  their  primitive  dwelling.     Near  by 
still  stand  of  "  Apollo-like" 

walnut-trees  a  "big  oak"  of  the 

;  ice.  Upon  an  outlying 
e  neglected  family 
,:  nci  r"  his 


score  of  the  g 

ied  and  1".. 

lack  even  these  poo?  >  show  that,  in 

the  narrow  cells  ben    •  resur- 


Early  Haunts  of  Whitman 

rection.  Upon  one  of  these  decaying  mounds 
Whitman — "  old,  poor,  and  paralyzed,"  revisit 
ing  the  place  after  an  absence  of  forty  years — 
sat  and  wrote  portions  of  his  "  Autobiographia," 
while  the  sigh  of  summer  winds,  the  song  of 
birds,  and  the  whir  and  hum  of  insects  sounded 
in  his  ears  as  they  do  in  ours  this  day. 

From  the  neighboring  eminence  of  Jayne's 
Hill,  to  which  Whitman  resorted,  we  overlook 
a  broad  and  beautiful  panorama,  unchanged 
since  it  gladdened  the  vision  of  the  bard  :  upon 
the  one  hand  lies  miles  of  the  diversified  North 
Shore,  with  more  remote  vistas  of  water  and 
white  sails ;  southward  we  see,  across  the  width 
of  "  Paumanok,"  with  its  wooded  ridges  and 
south-side  meadows,  the  Fire  Island  light  and 
the  low  dim  line  of  the  sea ;  and  westward — 
suffused  by  "  gorgeous,  vapory  hues  that  cover 
the  evening  sky" — an  expanse  of  lower  hills  and 
more  populous  plains  stretches  far  towards 
Whitman's  "  mast-hemmed  Manhattan." 

One  would  never  recognize  in  the  Hunting- 
ton  of  to-day  the  drowsy  village  Whitman 
sketched  well-nigh  sixty  years  ago.  The  dec 
ades  which  have  since  then  changed  the  place 
have  spared  a  few  of  those  friends  who  knew 
him  here  when  he  founded  The  Long  Islander, 
and  that  periodical  itself  still  flourishes.  We 

10  145 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

find  the  old  frame  building  in  which  it  was  pub 
lished  in  Whitman's  time  removed  now  from 
the  street  and  doing  humble  duty  as  a  stable. 
In  a  second-story  room  of  this  edifice,  reached 
by  an  outside  stairway,  he  composed,  edited, 
and  printed  his  paper,  and  here,  in  winter  even 
ings,  he  gathered  a  frolicsome  company  to  whom 
he  sometimes  read  his  poems,  which  he  already 
called  his  "  yawps,"  although  they  conformed  to 
the  conventional  canons  of  rhyme  and  poetic 
sentiment.  Not  far  away  is  the  ancient  hill 
cemetery  of  his  sketch,  with  the  forgotten 
pauper  graves  and  an  entrancing  prospect  of 
dreamful  spires,  verdant  hills,  shining  harbor, 
and  sail-flecked  sound.  Farther  inland  the  scene 
of  the  pathetic  sketch  of  "  Death  in  the  School- 
Room"  is  found  on  the  site  of  a  rural  school 
where  the  poet  himself  subsequently  taught  and 
"  boarded  round"  in  the  neighborhood. 

Away  towards  the  picturesque  cliffs  of  Mon- 
tauk  is  Peconic  Bay  and  the  region  to  which 
Whitman  retired  after  the  publication  of  the 
seemingly  egotistical  chants  of  "  Leaves  of 
Grass"  had  provoked,  from  the  many  for  whom 
the  free  and  exultant  stanzas  contained  no  mes 
sage,  a  storm  of  angry  denunciation ;  here  he 
spent  some  months,  which  he  afterwards  called 
"  the  happiest  of  his  life,"  reviewing  his  motives 
146 


Whitman  Scenes — The  Oldest  Poet 

and  resolving  anew  to  be  faithful  to  his  vision 
and  to  continue  his  work  in  his  own  way.  One 
of  the  amphibious  baymen  remembers  being 
sometimes  sent,  as  a  lad,  to  summon  Whitman 
to  his  dinner  in  the  humble  bayside  cabin,  and 
finding  the  "great  literary  Nebuchadnezzar" 
reclining  in  the  attitude  Conway  depicts, — 
supine  upon  the  sand  of  the  shore  and  gazing 
unwinkingly  at  the  summer  sun  or  its  scarcely 
less  dazzling  reflection  in  the  water,  or  else 
writing  in  a  home-made  note- book  which  he 
habitually  carried.  Here,  and  perhaps  in  the 
posture  mentioned,  he  wrote  some  minor  poems 
of  the  second  edition  of  his  book,  portions,  at 
least,  of  the  "  Song  of  the  Open  Road,"  and 
somewhat  more  of  the  "  Salut  au  Monde !"  the 
fishing  scene  of  which  he  witnessed  upon  the 
opposite  shore  of  the  island. 

Beyond  lies  Greenport  and  the  home  of  the 
nonagenarian  Isaac  McLellan, — school-mate  and 
life-long  associate  of  N.  P.  Willis,  college- 
friend  of  Hawthorne  and  Longfellow,  author 
of  the  much-quoted  "  Death  of  Napoleon"  and 
"  New  England's  Dead," — who  is  now  dis 
tinguished  as  the  oldest  living  poet.  A  pleasant 
and  substantial  farm-house  overlooking  the  Sound 
was  for  years  his  abode,  but  a  single-roomed 
structure  of  rough  boards,  standing  upon  the 
147 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

beach,  has  been  his  accustomed  retreat  and 
workshop  during  the  summers,  and  here  "  the 
"  poet-sportsman"  produced  much  of  the  poetry 
of  his  later  volumes. 

Facing  the  shore  of  Shelter  Island  Sound, 
not  far  from  the  quaint  old  whaling  town  of 
Sag  Harbor,  is  Oakhurst,  with  its  broad  acres  of 
field  and  woodland,  for  some  years  the  home  of 
the  brilliant  and  imaginative  novelist,  Julian 
Hawthorne.  Here  and  at  another  house  in  the 
village  the  poet  Stoddard  and  his  gifted  wife 
were  summer  guests  of  the  novelist,  and  here 
the  latter  wrote  his  most  valuable  "  Hawthorne 
and  his  Wife"  and  several  romances,  including 
"  Sinfire,"  which  appeared  in  Lippincotfs  Maga 
zine. 

Across  an  undulating,  wind-swept  plain  we 
come  to  the  ocean-bound  southern  shore  and  to 
the  quiet  and  quaintness  of  Easthampton, — that 
ancient  village  with  its  green  expanse  of  street 
bordered  by  majestic  trees,  its  ancestral  cottages 
of  weather-beaten  shingles,  its  gardens  of  old- 
fashioned  flowers,  and  its  memories  and  memen 
tos  of  the  author  of  "  Home,  Sweet  Home." 
The  omnipresent  geese  from  which  Payne  fled 
in  terror  as  a  child,  and  which  he  later  found 
"strutting  over  the  grass  in  measured  stateliness" 
in  such  numbers  that  he  called  the  place  "  Goose- 
148 


Scenes  of  "  Home,  Sweet  Home" 

heaven"  in  bis  letters,  have  mostly  disappeared, 
although  Mackay  Laffan  not  so  long  ago  found 
them  abundant  enough  to  suggest  that  the 
"  birds  singing  sweetly"  of  the  deathless  song 
were  ganders,  and  their  sweetness  was  a  hiss. 
A  few  other  features  mentioned  by  Payne  have 
vanished  with  the  years,  but  the  prevailing  tone 
and  air  of  the  vicinage  is  not  greatly  changed, 
and  it  still  furnishes  the  fitting  foil  and  contrast 
to  the  te  dazzling  splendor"  and  et  pleasures  and 
palaces"  of  his  epic. 

Among  the  more  primitive  dwellings  of  the 
village  is  the  "  lowly  cottage"  which  the  home 
sick  wanderer  had  in  mind  that  summer  night 
when,  seated  in  the  Champs  Elysees,  he  wrote 
the  tender  ballad  which  has  been  lovingly 
echoed  in  millions  of  hearts  in  every  clime  and 
condition.  It  is  an  antiquated,  story-and-a-half 
edifice  of  wood,  standing  near  the  broad,  grass- 
grown  avenue,  embosomed  among  old  trees  and 
climbing  vines,  with  great  fireplace  and  ample 
hearth  of  stone,  rough  floor  of  planks,  and  low 
ceilings  crossed  by  massive  beams, — the  whole 
fabric  toned  by  the  touch  of  time  into  an  aspect 
of  dignity  and  endearing  comeliness  which  is  in 
pleasing  contrast  with  the  ambitious  architecture 
of  the  present. 

Near  by,  in  the  pleasant  home  which  has  been 
149 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

hers  for  forty  years,  dwells  the  winsome  bru 
nette  lady — vivacious  and  bright-eyed  still — who 
was,  as  a  school-girl,  Payne's  petted  "  little 
sweetheart  Rosalie."  She  has  many  memories 
of  the  handsome  and  graceful  author  (who  was 
"  a  perfect  Cupid  in  beauty"),  and  religiously 
preserves  the  witty  and  gallant  letters  from  that 
wanderer  in  many  lands, — for  the  immortal 
poet  of  home  was  himself  homeless  ;  the  author 
of  a  song  which  enriched  publishers  and  singers 
was  himself  always  poor,  sometimes  destitute. 
While  his  intellectual  gifts  procured  for  him  the 
friendship  of  Coleridge,  Lamb,  Talma,  and 
Irving,  his  poverty  suggested  to  the  latter  the 
"  poor  devil  author"  in  "  Bracebridge  Hall,"  and 
he  died  at  last  of  a  neglected  fever  in  far-away 
Tunis.  "  Rosalie's"  copy  of  "  Home,  Sweet 
Home,"  as  Payne  wrote  it  for  the  opera  of 
"  Clari,"  differs  little  from  the  popular  version ; 
in  her  estimation  the  genuineness  of  the  alleged 
additional  lines  beginning  with, 

"  How  sweet  'tis  to  sit  'neath  a  fond  father's  smile," 

requires  further  attestation.  Better  authenticated, 
certainly,  are  the  stanzas  which  General  Wilson 
tells  us  Payne  addressed  to  a  wealthy  American 
lady  resident  in  London  and  presented  to  her 
150 


Memories  of  Payne 

within  a  copy  of  the  original  ballad ;  of  these 
stanzas  we  quote  the  last : 

t(  Your  exile  is  blest  with  all  fate  can  bestow, 
But  mine  has  been  checker' d  with  many  a  woe  ! 
Yet,  tho'  different  in  fortune,  our  thoughts  are  the  same, 
Ana  both,  as  we  think  of  Columbia,  exclaim, 
Home  !   sweet  home  ! 

There's  no  place  like  home!" 

Upon  the  wide,  park-like  street  still  stands  the 
edifice  of  the  Clinton  Academy, — now  used  as 
the  town  hall, — where  Payne's  father  was  the 
head  master ;  beneath  the  waving  grasses  that 
grow  in  the  breath  of  the  sea  in  the  Southern 
Cemetery,  watched  over  by  the  ancient  wind 
mill,  is  the  grave  of  the  poet's  maternal  grand 
father,  whose  epitaph  Duyckinck  transcribed, 
"  an  Israelite,  indeed,  in  whom  there  was  no 
guile,"  and,  near  it,  lulled  by  the  perpetual 
diapason  of  the  surf,  sleeps  the  author  of 
"  Ocean  Spray." 

Opposite  to  the  Academy  was  the  old  church 
of  Lyman  Beecher,  and  close  upon  the  road 
side  yet  stands  the  low-eaved  cottage  which 
was  twelve  years  his  home,  where  we  may  see 
his  study  and  the  opposite  parlor,  of  which 
his  vivacious  daughter  Catherine  wrote,  "  there 
I  was  born  at  five  P.M. — don't  remember  much 


Bryant,  Whitman,  etc. 

about  it  myself."  Another  old  house  was  some 
time  the  home  of  Johnson,  the  "  Neglected 
Poet,  No.  i"  of  Payne's  essay,  and  in  our  strolls 
through  and  about  the  village  we  realize  at 
every  turn  objects  and  beauties  that  Payne  de 
picted  in  that  sketch,  and  everywhere  hear  with 
him  the  waves  of  old  ocean  "  swinging  slow 
with  sullen  roar." 

With  the  same  solemn  monotone  sounding  in 
our  ears  we  sit,  a  later  day,  among  the  dunes  of 
Fire  Island  and  look  out  upon  the  sea,  as  beauti 
ful  now  in  the  summer  calm  as  it  was  terrible 
in  that  other  July  day,  near  fifty  years  ago,  when 
it  dashed  the  ship  Elizabeth  upon  these  cruel 
sands.  One  who  watched  the  vessel  slowly  go 
to  pieces  during  the  tardy  hours  of  that  awful 
day,  and  vainly  waited  days  afterwards,  with 
Sumner,  Thoreau,  and  Bayard  Taylor,  for  the 
sea  to  give  up  its  dead,  points  out  the  fateful 
spot  where  the  ship  struck  and  lay  pounding 
upon  the  beach,  the  place  where  the  body  of 
Margaret  Fuller's  child — yet  warm  from  his 
mother's  embrace — was  cast  upon  the  shore, 
the  place  of  its  first  sepulture  among  the  sands. 
With  these  sad  scenes  in  view,  we  listen  again 
to  the  tale  of  Margaret's  heroism  throughout 
the  terrible  hours,  of  her  comforting  and  in 
spiring  the  sailors,  of  her  singing  her  terrified 


Fire  Island — Margaret  Fuller 

boy  to  sleep  amid  the  furies  of  the  storm  ;  we 
see  that  last  vision  of  her  form,  clad  in  her 
night-dress,  with  her  bright,  long  hair  falling 
upon  her  shoulders,  clinging  at  the  foot  of  the 
mast  the  instant  before  the  pitiless  waves  en 
gulfed  her  forever. 

The  precious  manuscript  of  her  "  Revolutions 
in  Italy,"  the  book  for  which  the  friends  of 
Italian  liberty  had  eagerly  waited,  perished 
here  with  its  devoted  author. 


153 


COOPER  SHRINES  AND  SCENES 


In  New  Tork  City-New  Rochelle-Paine1  s  Home  and  Monu- 
ment-Heathcote  Hill-*1  Closet  Hall "-Angrvine-W 'here 
Cooper  first  wrote-Scenes  of  "  The  Spy" -Jay's  Bedford 
House- Otsego-Cooper"1 s  Home  and  Grave— Recollections— 
Scenes,  Incidents,  and  Characters  of  "  The  Deer  slayer," 
"  Pioneers,"  etc. 


places  where  Cooper,  our  "  prose  poet 
of  the  silent  woods  and  stormy  seas," 
completed  some  of  his  wonderful  romances  are 
still  to  be  seen  among  the  literary  landmarks  of 
Manhattan.  On  the  farther  shore  of  picturesque 
Hell-Gate,  and  encompassed  by  smiling  fields 
and  bowering  orchards,  once  stood  the  modest 
brown  cottage  where,  interrupted  by  a  well- 
nigh  fatal  illness,  he  produced  "  The  Last  of  the 
Mohicans,"  the  most  uniformly  exciting  and 
powerful  of  his  fictions ;  while,  farther  afield, 
beyond  the  romantic  valley  of  the  Bronx,  with 
its  memories  of  Drake,  Halleck,  and  Poe,  we 
find,  amid  scenes  of  his  tales,  other  haunts  of 
Cooper,  as  well  as  of  authors  of  lesser  or  later 
fame. 

Faring  along  the  charming  Westchester  shores, 
we  traverse  a  region  whose  older  settlements  are 
replete  with  story  and  tradition,  and  find  among 
154 


New  Rochelle — Thomas  Paine 

these  the  town  of  New  Rochelle, — with  its 
somber  unwritten  romances  of  Huguenot  en 
durance  and  endeavor, — one  of  the  most  attrac 
tive  and  engaging.  Here  that  gifted  and  fertile 
novelist,  Julian  Hawthorne,  erected  for  a  time 
his  household  gods  after  his  return  from  Jamaica, 
and  the  delightful  home  of  John  Habberton, 
author  of  the  once  popular  "  Helen's  Babies,"  is 
in  the  same  neighborhood.  Here,  also,  was  the 
abode  of  the  poet  William  Legget,  the  beloved 
friend  and  associate  of  Bryant,  who  wrote  a 
touching  poetic  tribute  to  his  memory.  A  mile 
outside  the  old  town,  the  quaint,  shingle-sided 
farm-house  which  was  for  years  the  home  of 
Thomas  Paine  still  stands  upon  the  estate  which 
was  granted  to  him  by  the  government  for  his 
patriotic  literary  services.  By  the  road-side,  at 
the  entrance  to  a  lane  which  leads  to  the  house, 
is  the  monument  which  was  erected  to  his 
memory  near  the  spot  where  he  was  once 
interred.  It  is  a  plain,  square  shaft,  crowned 
with  a  tasteful  capital  and  inscribed  with  cita 
tions  from  his  works, — such  as,  "  I  believe  in 
one  god  and  hope  for  happiness  beyond  this 
life,"  "  The  world  is  my  country  ;  to  do  good 
my  religion,"  and  others  whose  generosity  and 
patriotism  should  have  protected  this  memorial 
from  the  damage  and  defilement  it  has  suffered. 
155 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

At  New  Rochelle,  too,  we  trace  the  footsteps 
of  Cooper  ;  the  present  Episcopal  church  is  suc 
cessor  to  the  plainer  edifice  in  which  he  often 
worshipped  during  his  residence  in  Westchester  ; 
beyond  the  town,  and  along  his  accustomed  drive 
to  the  sanctuary,  is  the  place  of  the  "  haunted 
wood"  of  his  daughter's  narrative,  and  here  we 
find  ourselves  within  the  frontier  of  the  district 
which  he  made  the  theatre  of  many  stirring 
events  of  the  first  distinctly  American  novel 
ever  written.  A  few  miles  distant,  upon  a  com 
manding  elevation  near  the  Sound,  yet  remains 
the  Heathcote  Hill  mansion  in  which  the  lovely 
Susan  Augusta  de  Lancey  was  born ;  here  she 
was  wooed  by  Cooper, — then  a  handsome  young 
naval  officer, — here  they  were  married  and  re 
sided  a  year  or  two  with  her  parents,  and  here 
their  daughter,  Susan  Fenimore  Cooper,  author 
of  "  Pages  and  Pictures,"  "  Rural  Hours,"  etc., 
was  born.  We  find  the  old  house  a  spacious 
and  severely  plain  parallelogram  of  wood  with  a 
veranda  extending  along  its  front,  and,  except 
for  the  wear  and  weathering  of  eight  decades,  in 
nowise  altered  since  Cooper  dwelt  there.  It 
still  looks  out  upon  the  enchanting  view  of  shore 
and  sound  which  he  loved  ;  some  of  the  great 
trees  which  waved  their  foliage  above  him,  lin 
gering  here  with  sweetheart  or  bride,  yet  shade 
156 


Heathcote  Hill — Angevine 

the  grounds,  and  the  household  which  welcomed 
him  and  gave  to  him  a  beloved  daughter  lie  in 
death  in  the  little  grass-grown  cemetery  hard  by 
the  old  home. 

The  smaller  house  in  which  Cooper  com 
menced  house-keeping,  and  which  he  called 
"  Closet  Hall,"  from  the  diminutive  size  of  its 
rooms,  stood  a  little  farther  eastward  upon  the 
"  Neck,"  which  he  describes  as  a  home  of  the 
Littlepage  family  in  the  tale  of  "  Satanstoe,"  and 
has  been  entirely  rebuilt.  Two  venerable  wil 
lows  survive  of  the  group  which  once  almost 
concealed  Cooper's  little  home  and  which  gave 
a  name  to  the  place  during  the  later  occupancy 
of  Alice  B.  Havens,  who  here  wrote  some  of 
her  poems  and  tales.  A  few  miles  inland  from 
Heathcote  Hill  we  come,  through  a  beautifully 
diversified  country  and  by  a  way  over  which 
Cooper,  for  years,  made  a  daily  excursion  for  his 
mail,  to  the  commanding  elevation  of  Angevine, 
— a  portion  of  the  de  Lancey  estate  which  was 
bestowed  upon  Mrs.  Cooper  after  her  marriage, 
and  where  the  novelist  designed  and  built  the 
picturesque  cottage  in  which  his  literary  career 
began.  After  years  of  neglect  and  delapidation, 
his  house  has  been  demolished  and  a  modern 
dwelling  erected  near  by,  the  lawns  and  shrub 
beries  he  laid  out  and  rooted  have  been  destroyed 
157 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

or  transformed,  most  of  his  trees  have  disap 
peared,  and  nothing  that  Cooper  knew  remains 
unchanged  save  the  view  which  drew  him  to 
make  here  his  home.  That  is,  indeed,  superb, 
embracing  wave-like  sweeps  of  field  and  park, 
mead  and  copse,  which  stretch  away  to  darker 
woodlands  on  the  one  hand  or  decline  to  the 
headlands  and  curving  beaches  of  the  shore  on 
the  other  ;  mile  upon  mile  of  the  shimmering, 
sail-dotted  Sound, — scene  of  some  of  the  feats  of 
his  "  Water-Witch," — and,  beyond  that,  the  dis 
tant  shore  of  Long  Island,  a  long  blue  line  which 
rises  into  the  hills  that  overlook  Bryant's  Roslyn. 
One  who  long  knew  this  sometime  dwelling 
of  Cooper  indicates,  upon  the  site,  its  dimensions 
and  arrangement,  and  locates  for  us  the  room 
where  Cooper,  in  response  to  his  wife's  playful 
challenge,  made  the  essay  which  determined  his 
career  and  eventually  gave  to  America  its  first 
great  novelist.  The  windows  of  this  room 
commanded  an  expanse  of  the  landscape  in  which 
he  delighted,  and  here,  with  this  inspiring  vision 
outspread  before  him,  he  wrote  (besides  his 
initial  "  Precaution")  that  epoch-making  book, 
"  The  Spy,"  which  was  the  first  revolt  in 
American  fiction  against  the  prevailing  servile 
imitation  of  European  models,  and  a  portion  of 
"  The  Pioneers,"  works  which  speedily  won  for 
158 


Scenes  of  "  The  Spy" 

him  world-wide  fame  and  which  are  not  dwarfed 
in  vigor  or  interest  by  his  later  productions. 

By  reason  of  its  local  associations,  it  is  "  The 
Spy"  which  most  concerns  us  as  we  loiter  in 
the  place  where  it  was  written.  In  this  home 
Cooper  saw,  "  staff  in  hand  and  pack  at  back," 
the  strolling  peddler  whose  occupation  and  per 
sonal  appearance  the  novelist  conferred  upon  his 
hero,  Harvey  Birch ;  and  all  about  him  here  the 
country-side  was  rife  with  memories  of  the  tur 
bulent  times  he  pictured  in  the  tale.  Every  road 
had  felt  the  tread  of  armed  men,  every  valley 
had  been  a  theatre  of  bloody  strife,  every  farm 
or  hamlet  had  been  plundered  or  destroyed, 
and  it  was  in  these  real  scenes  that  he  laid  the 
fancied  incidents  of  his  story.  From  the  site  of 
his  home  we  can  see  the  point  where,  in  the 
tale,  the  British  regulars  landed,  and  to  which 
they  retreated  after  the  battle ;  not  far  away  is 
the  valley  where  they  fought  with  the  Virginians, 
and  beyond  is  the  fine  old  residence  in  which 
Cooper  centred  so  much  of  the  interest  of  the 
romance  and  about  which  he  placed  the  scenes 
of  many  of  its  exciting  occurrences.  We  find 
this  ancient  mansion  occupied  by  descendants  of 
the  family  the  novelist  used  to  visit  here,  and 
changed  only  by  the  erection  of  a  piazza  across 
its  front  since  the  time  he  knew  it  well :  it  is 
159 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

still  environed  by  great  numbers  of  the  vener 
able  trees  which  he  saw  and  from  which  the 
place  derived  the  appellation  by  which  it  is  still 
known,  "  The  Locusts," — the  name  by  which 
he  designates  it  in  the  tale  and  which  it  had 
borne  long  years  before  the  tale  was  written.  A 
descendant  of  Cooper's  friends  in  this  old  man 
sion  finds  for  us  at  "  The  Four  Corners" — an 
other  scene  prominent  in  "  The  Spy" — the  site 
and  remnant  of  an  old  building  which  Cooper 
knew,  and  which  he  described  as  Betty  Flana 
gan's  hotel,  from  which  Harvey  Birch  made  his 
escape  disguised  in  Betty's  attire. 

Farther  away  the  Bedford  House  stands  upon 
its  sightly  eminence,  little  altered  by  the  laps 
ing  years  since  Cooper  was  a  frequent  guest 
within  its  old  walls.  It  is  still  the  heritage  and 
summer  home  of  the  Jays,  who  preserve  here 
many  of  the  heirlooms  and  belongings  of  the 
olden  time.  In  the  wistaria-mantled  library 
may  still  be  seen  volumes  which  the  novelist 
consulted,  and  upon  the  broad  piazza,  under  the 
ancient  lindens,  one  may  rest  and  look  abroad 
upon  a  magnificent  landscape  from  the  spot 
where  he  sat  one  long-ago  summer  day  and 
heard  from  the  lips  of  the  venerable  Governor 
Jay  the  story  of  a  poor  and  ignorant,  but  brave, 
shrewd,  and  unselfishly  patriotic  man  whom  Jay 
160 


Bedford  House — Otsego 

had  employed  as  a  spy  during  the  Revolution. 
The  character  thus  here  portrayed  so  im 
pressed  the  novelist  that  he  made  this  (to  him) 
unknown  and  nameless  person  the  hero  of  his 
great  patriotic  tale. 

These  and  other  localities  of  the  "neutral 
ground,"  over  which  Cooper  cast  the  glamour 
of  romance,  are  full  of  charm,  but  it  is  the  shore 
of  his  beloved  Otsego, — "  Susquehanna's  utmost 
spring," — where  most  of  his  life  was  spent  and 
most  of  his  work  was  done,  and  where  he  now 
sleeps  amid  the  scenes  he  celebrated,  that  power 
fully  attracts  and  holds  the  Cooper  pilgrim.  Over 
this  secluded  highland  district  the  memory  of 
Cooper  holds  regal  monopoly,  his  name  and  his 
imagination  have  made  it  one  of  the  literary 
Meccas  of  America.  The  home  of  his  child 
hood,  it  remained  through  life  the  home  of  his 
heart,  and  was  no  less  the  abiding-place  of  his 
fancy  and  genius.  His  boyish  impressions  were 
all  associated  with  this  lovely  lake  and  the  tradi 
tion-haunted  forests  that  clothed  its  banks ;  from 
these  he  derived  the  knowledge  and  love  of 
nature  which  made  it  possible  for  him  to  become 
what  Balzac  called  "the  master  landscape-painter 
of  fiction."  He  wrote  best  of  the  scenes  he 
most  loved  :  of  that  dramatic  series  of  tales  by 
ii  161 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

which  he  is  best  known  and  will  be  longest  re 
membered,  the  first  and  last  written  books  begin 
and  end  with  honest  Natty  Bumppo  on  the  fair 
shores  of  the  lake  which  lay  at  the  door  of 
Cooper's  Otsego  Hall. 

His  manorial  home  was  erected  during  the 
childhood  of  the  novelist,  upon  the  verge  of  an 
almost  unbroken  wilderness,  by  his  father,  who 
was  the  Judge  Temple  of  "  The  Pioneers."  It 
was  pictured  in  that  book  as  Templeton  Hall, — 
a  name  by  which  it  was  afterwards  often  called, — 
and  the  character  of  the  life  the  boy  Cooper 
witnessed  within  its  walls  is  well  illustrated  in 
the  tale.  Among  its  guests  in  the  early  time 
was  Prince  Talleyrand,  a  souvenir  of  whose 
visit  is  preserved  in  his  complimentary  acrostic 
to  the  novelist's  sister,  who  was  afterwards  thrown 
from  her  horse  and  killed. 

"  Aimable  philosophe  au  printems  de  son  age, 
Ni  les  terns,  ni  les  lieux  n'alterent  son  esprit; 
Ne  cedant  qu'a  ses  gouts,  simple  et  sans  6talage 
Au  milieu  des  d6serts,  elle  lit,  pense,  6crit. 

Cultivez,  belle  Anna,  votre  gout  pour  l'6tude; 
On  ne  saurait  ici  mieux  employer  son  terns ; 
Otsego  n'est  pas  gai — mais  tout  est  habitude; 
Paris  vous  de*plairait  fort  au  premier  moment ; 
Et  qui  jouit  de  soi  dans  une  solitude, 
Rentrant  au  monde,  est  sur  d'en  faire  I'ornement." 
162 


Otsego  Hall 

After  Cooper's  return  from  abroad  he  repaired 
and  refashioned  the  Hall,  converting  it  into  a 
most  dignified  and  charming  country-seat,  and 
here  passed  the  remainder  of  his  life.  At  his 
death  his  family  was  obliged  to  relinquish  it ;  it 
became  for  a  single  season  a  summer  hotel,  and 
then  was  destroyed  by  fire.  It  is  remembered 
as  a  spacious  and  imposing  structure  of  brick, 
with  battlemented  walls  and  mullioned  windows, 
and  with  a  heavy  porch  enclosing  the  entrance. 
Within,  a  hall  of  princely  dimensions  occupied 
the  central  portion  of  the  edifice  and  was  the 
usual  family  sitting-room ;  at  the  right  of  this 
was  the  library,  in  which  Cooper  accomplished 
all  the  literary  work  of  his  later  years.  One 
who,  in  his  youth,  was  familiar  with  this  interior 
describes  the  library  as  a  large,  book-lined  room 
with  dark  oaken  wainscots,  and  with  deeply 
recessed  windows,  near  one  of  which,  in  front 
of  the  generous  fireplace,  usually  stood  the  novel 
ist's  writing-table.  On  the  opposite  side  of  the 
great  hall  was  his  sleeping-apartment,  where  he 
peacefully  expired  on  the  last  day  of  his  sixty- 
first  year. 

Of  the  ideally  happy  home-life  in  this  house 
Cooper's  daughter  and  others  have  given  us  de 
lightful  glimpses,  which  incidentally  show  the 
essential  lovableness  of  his  character.  During 
163 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

the  years  of  his  later  residence  here  he  was — 
largely  in  consequence  of  his  sometimes  indis 
creet  but  not  wholly  undeserved  criticisms  upon 
the  manners,  tastes,  and  ambitions  of  his  coun 
trymen — subjected  to  a  storm  of  violent  obloquy 
and  detraction  such  as  no  other  American  author 
has  ever  experienced,  and  it  was  the  influence 
of  this  home  and  the  loyal  devotion  of  its  in 
mates  which  saved  his  generous  nature  from 
total  embitterment  and  heartened  him  for  the 
gallant  and  effective  fight  he  waged  against  his 
calumniators.  Notwithstanding  the  distractions 
of  many  controversies  and  litigations,  the  term 
of  his  abode  in  the  seclusion  of  the  old  Hall 
was  that  of  his  highest  literary  fecundity.  It 
was  his  habit  to  pace  up  and  down  the  great 
hall  in  the  gathering  twilight  of  each  closing  day, 
silently  pondering  his  compositions  and  plan 
ning  new  chapters  of  the  work  in  hand ;  in  the 
adjoining  library  he,  next  morning,  wrote  out 
the  results  of  this  hour  of  deep  cogitation,  or 
dictated  them  to  his  daughter,  and  in  this  man 
ner  seventeen  novels  and  several  volumes  of 
travel  and  history  were  here  produced. 

Among    the    romances    were    "The    Deer- 
slayer"    and    "  The     Pathfinder,"     the    works 
which    indicate    the    meridian    height    of   his 
artistic  genius  ;  "  Afloat  and  Ashore,"  in  which 
164 


Life  and  Work  at  Otsego 

it  is  thought  he  tells  something  of  his  own 
young  manhood  and  of  his  love  for  the  lady 
who  became  his  wife  ;  and  "  Home  as  Found," 
containing  some  account  of  the  famous  Three- 
Mile  Point  controversy.  The  scenes  of  the 
first  and  last  of  these  are  laid  among  Cooper's 
daily  haunts  in  the  neighborhood  of  this  be 
loved  home.  Here,  too,  was  written  the  story 
of  "  Ned  Myers,"  a  shipmate  of  the  author  in 
his  first  voyages,  who  has  been  believed  to  be 
the  natural  half-brother  of  Queen  Victoria ;  the 
long  visit,  at  the  Hall,  of  this  decrepit  old  man, 
who  here  detailed  to  his  more  fortunate  friend 
the  adventures  upon  which  the  book  is  founded, 
is  still  remembered  by  a  few.  Cooper  had  here 
projected  and  collected  materials  for  other  works, 
and  one  was  partially  completed  when  death  dis 
missed  him  from  his  tasks. 

The  place  of  Cooper's  once  cherished  garden 
was  long  traversed  by  a  village  street,  in  which 
an  enclosed  mound,  surmounted  by  a  suitably  in 
scribed  boulder,  for  years  marked  the  site  of  his 
beloved  home.  The  street  has  been  recently 
closed,  the  boulder  has  been  replaced  by  a  rep 
lica  of  J.  Q.  A.  Ward's  bronze  statue  of  "  The 
Indian  Hunter,"  and  the  grounds  which  the  nov 
elist  planned  and  planted  have  been,  after  forty 
years  of  neglect  and  desolation,  converted  into 
165 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

a  spacious  and  tasteful  park,  in  which  many  of 
his  trees  are  yet  to  be  seen. 

The  picturesque  cottage  of  his  daughters, 
still  occupied  by  one  of  them,  stands  nearer  the 
Susquehanna,  and  is  constructed  largely  of 
materials  rescued  from  the  ruins  of  Cooper's 
home.  Here  are  sacredly  preserved  many  of 
his  personal  belongings,  including  the  chair  in 
which  he  sat  to  write,  his  writing  utensils,  the 
walnut  table  upon  which  all  his  later  works 
were  penned,  several  of  his  manuscripts,  and 
some  portion  of  his  library.  Here,  too,  are 
numerous  mementos  of  his  gifted  daughter, 
Susan  Fenimore,  who  lived,  wrote,  and  died 
beneath  this  roof,  and  whose  monument  is  the 
noble  orphanage  which  stands  by  the  stream  a 
short  distance  below. 

But  a  few  rods  from  the  site  of  his  home 
we  find,  beneath  the  mourning  trees  he  tended, 
the  spot  where  Cooper  rests  from  the  stress  and 
fever  of  life,  among  his  kindred  and  beside  the 
wife  who  quickly  followed  him  into  the  great 
unknown.  His  tomb  is  within  the  enclosure 
of  the  church  of  which  he  was  long  a  warden, 
and  is  marked  by  a  heavy  slab  inscribed  with 
his  name  and  graven  with  the  emblem  of  the 
faith  in  which  he  died. 

All  about  these  shrines  lies  a  region  doubly 
1 66 


Mementos — Grave 

hallowed  by  Cooper's  personal  presence  and  by 
association  with  the  creations  of  his  fancy. 
"  The  Deerslayer"  and  "  The  Pioneers,"  read 
here  among  the  scenes  they  depict,  assume  the 
character  of  veritable  history  ;  their  unreal  actors 
are  so  vividly  portrayed  that  they  seem  as  real 
as  Cooper  himself,  and  it  passes,  therefore,  that 
the  literary  pilgrim,  who  here  finds  the  haunts 
of  the  novelist  and  the  scenes  of  the  heroes  of 
his  forest  epics  everywhere  intermingled,  will 
esteem  them  alike  interesting  and  actual.  The 
fame  and  fiction  of  Cooper  have  furnished  a 
nomenclature  for  the  entire  country-side. 
Cooperstown  has  its  "  Pioneer"  and  "  Leather- 
stocking"  streets  ;  the  "  Cooper"  and  the  "  Fen- 
imore"  have  been  its  chief  hostelries ;  the 
"  Natty  Bumppo"  steamer  and  the  "  Pioneer" 
yacht  ply  on  the  pretty  lake ;  "  Point  Judith," 
"Hutter's  Point,"  "Camp  Hurry  Harry," 
"  Natty  Bumppo  Landing,"  etc.,  are  upon  the 
shores  ;  and  "  Leatherstocking  Falls,"  "  Leather- 
stocking  Cave,"  "  Leatherstocking  Brook,"  etc., 
are  in  the  neighborhood. 

In  the  village  we  see  a  handsome  new  court 
house  occupying  the  site  of  the  structure  in 
which  Cooper  conducted  the  first  of  the  long 
and  almost  uniformly  successful  series  of  libel 
suits  against  his  detractors,  and  where  was  held 
167 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

the  indignation  meeting  which,  in  ft  ungram- 
matic  scorn,"  denounced  him  for  disputing  the 
claim  of  the  community  to  ownership  of  Three- 
Mile  Point,  and  requested  that  his  writings 
should  be  removed  from  the  public  library. 
We  are  told  by  villagers  who  remember  events 
which  never  occurred  that,  upon  this  occasion, 
Cooper's  books  were  ignominiously  burned  in 
the  street.  The  Otsego  Herald,  in  whose  com 
posing-room  the  boy  Cooper  worked  as  an 
amateur,  died  long  years  ago,  but  the  Republican 
— the  paper  against  which  his  first  litigation 
was  directed — still  flourishes  in  the  village. 
The  Academy  of  the  novelist's  boyhood — where 
William  Leete  Stone,  historian  of  "  Wyoming," 
"  Border  Wars  of  the  American  Revolution," 
etc.,  was  also  a  pupil — and  the  later  edifice  in 
which  John  Burroughs  passed  a  school  term 
are  succeeded  by  the  present  High  School. 
We  find  part  of  the  site  of  the  Bold  Dragoon 
Inn  of  "  The  Pioneers"  covered  now  by  the 
Main  Street,  and  the  St.  Paul's  Church,  planned 
and  erected  by  the  Sheriff  and  Hiram  Doolittle 
of  that  tale,  has  given  place  to  the  pretty  little 
fane  by  which  the  great  romancer  himself  now 
reposes.  At  this  day  may  be  found  in  the 
neighborhood  the  grandchildren  of  the  venera 
ble  fisherman  who  for  sixty  years  "  trolled  for 
168 


Reminiscences — Scenes  of  Tales 

pickerel  or  angled  for  perch"  in  the  waters  of 
the  lake,  and  who  was  minutely  pictured  by 
Cooper  in  the  Commodore  of  "  Home  as 
Found,"  and  still  lingering  here  are  traditional 
recollections  of  an  aged  hunter  named  Shipman, 
whom  the  novelist  had  often  seen  in  his  own 
youth,  and  whose  appearance  and  equipment 
vaguely  suggested  to  him  the  hero  of  the 
"  Leatherstocking"  tales  as  he  was  depicted  in 
the  initial  volume  of  the  series. 

The  lovely  lake  is  the  Glimmerglass  of  "  The 
Deerslayer,"  and  its  limped  waters  and  verdure- 
clad  shores  form  the  fitting  framework  for  the  pic 
tures  of  that  tale.  From  the  Sleeping  Lion  to 
the  lake's  outlet,  near  his  own  door,  Cooper  de 
scribed  these  inspiring  scenes  with  such  photo 
graphic  accuracy  that  we  may  easily  identify  the 
locality  of  every  thrilling  event  his  fancy  con 
jured  here,  and  we  find  many  of  them  not  greatly 
changed  since  he  saw  them.  Just  where  the 
Susquehanna  leaves  the  lake  on  its  long  journey 
to  the  sea  the  famous  Otsego  Rock  still  "  shows 
its  chin  above  the  water,"  as  in  the  day  when 
Deerslayer  and  Hurry  Harry  discovered  Tom 
Hutter's  ark  in  the  narrow  stream  below.  We 
find  the  rock  a  rounded,  water-worn,  and  par 
tially  submerged  boulder,  whose  dimensions  dis 
appoint  us  when  we  remember  that  this  was  the 
169 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

celebrated  council-rock  and  rendezvous  of  the 
aborigines  to  which  the  Great  Serpent  of  the 
Delawares  came  to  meet  Deerslayer  in  order  to 
go  upon  the  war-path,  and  the  spot  where,  in 
one  thrilling  chapter  of  the  romance,  the  hostile 
braves  dropped  from  a  jutting  branch  upon  the 
deck  of  Hutter's  unique  craft.  The  rock  and 
the  adjacent  lake-margin  are  now  the  possession 
of  a  grandson  of  the  novelist  who  bears  his 
name.  Upon  the  eastern  shore  rises  Cooper's 
fair  Mount  Vision,  with  its  enchanting  and  far- 
reaching  prospect,  and  upon  one  of  its  lower 
inclines  we  find,  near  the  opening  scene  of  "  The 
Pioneers,"  the  tall  Cooper  monument  which  was 
erected  by  the  immediate  friends  of  the  romancer, 
aided  by  the  contributions  which  Irving,  Bryant, 
Halleck,  Paulding,  etc.,  had  previously  secured 
towards  a  colossal  statue  in  the  metropolis.  The 
base  of  the  memorial  bears  the  name  of  Cooper 
and  is  sculptured  with  emblems  appropriately 
symbolizing  his  work  ;  the  tapering  shaft  is  sur 
mounted  by  a  statue  of  Leatherstocking,  which 
overlooks  the  lake  from  the  hill-side  where  that 
hero  loved  to  roam.  Not  far  away  is  the  spot 
where  he  rescued  Miss  Temple  from  the  panther, 
and  in  a  steep  hill-side  is  the  cave  where  he  in 
trenched  hims.elf  against  the  officers  of  the  law. 
Upon  this  eastern  shore,  too,  is  the  Chalet, — 
170 


Setting  of  Tales 

Cooper's  picturesque  mountain  farm  to  which 
he  habitually  resorted  after  the  literary  work  of 
the  day  was  done,  and  found  relaxation  in  direct 
ing  the  operations  of  his  workmen  in  a  costly 
contest  with  the  soil.  His  daily  excursions  to 
this  farm  in  a  quaint  vehicle  to  which  was 
attached  a  rather  sorry  beast — called  "  Pump 
kin"  by  Cooper's  daughters — are  yet  occasionally 
recalled  in  the  vicinage  of  his  home.  We  find 
his  farm-house  still  standing,  and  from  the  steep 
acclivities  of  the  farm  we  behold  the  beautiful 
views  of  lake,  river-valley,  and  mountain  which 
were  his  especial  delight  and  which  prompted 
him  to  write  "  The  Deerslayer."  While  over 
looking  the  lake  from  the  height  of  the  Chalet 
he  outlined  all  the  movements  of  Hutter's  ark 
in  that  tale,  and  it  was  here  he  witnessed  the 
processes  of  tracing  and  recovering  a  swarm  of 
bees — by  a  man  who  had  followed  them  across 
the  lake — which  determined  him  to  make  one 
of  the  principal  characters  of  "  The  Oak  Open 
ings"  a  bee  hunter. 

Most  of  the  scenes  of  "  The  Deerslayer"  lie 
upon  the  western  shore.  Here,  at  the  first  pro 
jecting  point  above  the  village,  Hutter  and 
Hurry  landed  in  quest  of  scalps  and  nearly  lost 
their  own ;  near  the  shore  of  "  Rat's  Cove," 
behind  this  little  cape,  was  the  first  encamp- 
171 


Cooper  Shrines  and  Scenes 

ment  of  the  Hurons ;  a  pretty,  shaded  promon 
tory  some  distance  above  is  Three-Mile  Point, 
the  scene  of  the  rescue  of  Wah-ta-Wah  by  the 
Great  Serpent  and  Deerslayer  and  of  the  capture 
of  the  latter  by  the  Hurons.  It  was  a  con 
troversy  concerning  the  ownership  of  this  point 
which  led  to  Cooper's  first  libel-suit  and,  inci 
dentally,  to  the  production  of  the  tale  of  "  Home 
as  Found."  As  in  the  novelist's  time,  so  now, 
this  point  is  used  as  a  public  pleasure-ground, 
being  now  leased  from  Mr.  William  Cooper,  of 
Baltimore,  for  that  purpose.  Farther  northward 
lies  Five-Mile  Point,  the  site  of  the  Huron  camp 
to  which  Deerslayer  returned  to  give  himself  up 
to  torture  and  death,  and  the  scene  of  his  ultimate 
rescue  by  the  British  regulars.  He  killed  his 
first  Indian  on  a  gravelly  point  of  the  opposite 
shore,  above  which  lies  the  fringe  of  wooded 
heights  where  rose  the  star  that  was  to  time  the 
meeting  of  Hist  with  her  lover.  Beyond  is  the 
shoal  which  was  the  site  of  Floating  Tom's  log 
stronghold,  and,  as  we  rest  our  oars  above  the 
spot,  with  so  many  scenes  of  the  tale  within 
our  vision,  it  is  more  than  ever  difficult  to  realize 
that  the  Muskrat  Castle,  with  its  occupants  and 
the  thrilling  incidents  laid  within  and  about  it, 
are  but  the  creations  of  a  fertile  fancy ;  and,  as 
we  row  slowly  northward,  we  find  ourselves 
172 


Setting  of  Tales 

scanning  the  bottom  in  search  of  the  mounds 
which  Hutter  heaped  upon  his  dead  and  the 
stone  by  which  poor,  simple  Hetty  knew  the 
place  of  their  watery  sepulchre. 

The  quiet  beauty  of  Otsego  abundantly  justi 
fies  the  love  and  laudation  which  Cooper  lavished 
upon  it.  With  its  curving  bays,  its  low,  green 
points,  and  its  picturesque,  verdure-vested  shores, 
the  clear  lake  sparkles  in  the  sunlight  like  a  great 
gem  in  a  setting  of  emerald  ;  under  the  summer 
sky,  water,  mountain,  and  forest  compose  a  pic 
ture  whose  loveliness  will  long  linger  in  the 
memory.  But  its  associations  with  Cooper  and 
his  works  constitute  its  greatest  charm,  his  spirit 
pervades  and  animates  all  the  scene.  Over  all 
the  myriad  and  diverse  natural  beauties  of  his 
Glimmerglass  and  its  shores  he  has  woven  an 
enchantment  from  which  we  are  never  free 
while  we  linger  here  ;  and,  whether  we  float 
upon  the  water  or  tread  the  forest  way,  we  are 
subtly  conscious  that  both  are  haunted  by  the 
beings  his  genius  here  evoked  ;  unwittingly  our 
ears  are  alert  to  hear  them,  half-expectantly  our 
eyes  seek  them  in  every  vista  of  the  lake,  in 
every  deep  wood  glade. 


173 


IRVING'S  SUNNYSIDE  AND 
SLEEPY   HOLLOW 


Sunny  side-Description— Environment—  Irving*  3  Study  and  Rooms 
—History— Associations  ivith  Irving' s  Works— Eminent 
Visitors— Tarrytoiun— Memorials  and  Shrines-Sleepy  Hol 
low—Scenes  of  Legend—"  Brom  Bones" -Ancient  Dutch 
Church  and  Cemetery-Grave  of  Irving. 

E  shrines  of  that  great  pioneer  of  New- 
World  literature,  Washington  Irving,  are 
found  near  the  Hudson, — the  noble  river  to 
which  he  gave  the  love  of  a  long  lifetime,  by 
whose  banks  he  was  born  and  passed  so  many 
of  his  years,  and  whose  shores  and  waters  his 
genius  invested  with  the  glowing  splendors  of 
romance  and  legend.  Paramount  among  these 
shrines  is  Sunnyside,  the  charming  little  nook 
to  which,  laden  with  honors  and  cheered  by 
the  benedictions  of  the  world  of  readers,  he  re 
tired  when  his  wanderings  were  ended,  to  com 
plete  his  work  and  to  spend  the  benign  autumn 
of  life  amid  the  fond  scenes  of  his  youth  and 
fancy. 

The  score  miles  of  storied  river-shore  which 
we  traverse  between  Irving's  birthplace  and  this 
haven  of  his  age  are  strewn  with  scenes  and  ob 
jects  which  appeal  to  the  lettered  wayfarer  ;  but, 
174 


living's  House 

disregarding  these  for  the  present,  we  fare  north 
ward  along  the  old  Post  Road,  through  a  region 
decked  with  opulent  country-seats,  and  find,  a 
little  beyond  the  pretty  village  of  Irvington,  a 
secluded  and  shadowy  lane  which  leads  us,  be 
tween  overarching  trees  and  gray,  lichened  walls, 
down  a  declivity  and  by  a  wimpling  rivulet  until 
we  see  the  sheen  of  the  river  through  the  foliage 
and  find  ourselves  at  Sunnyside. 

A  more  enchanting  retreat  or  one  better  suited, 
by  its  beauty  and  tranquil  retirement,  to  the  idylic 
life  Irving  led  here  it  would  be  scarcely  possible 
to  find.  Upon  a  "  sweet  green  bank,"  bowered 
by  jealous  trees  and  peeping  forth  upon  the  river 
of  his  love,  nestles  the  unique  and  picturesque 
dwelling  which  Irving  restored  from  the  "  Wol- 
fert's  Roost"  of  his  "  Chronicles," — the  "  little 
old-fashioned  mansion,  all  made  up  of  gable-ends, 
as  full  of  angles  and  corners  as  an  old  cocked  hat" 
and  believed  to  have  been  "  modelled  after  the 
hat  of  Peter  the  Headstrong."  It  is  a  quaint, 
story-and-a-half  structure  of  stuccoed  stone,  with 
sloping  roofs,  dormer  windows,  and  steep,  crow- 
stepped  gables,  which  are  still  surmounted  by 
the  ancient  weather-vanes  Irving  described, — the 
cock  of  portly  Dutch  dimensions  from  the  Stadt 
House  of  Knickerbocker's  New  Amsterdam  and 
the  gilded  horse  from  the  great  Van  der  Heyden 
175 


Irving's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

palace  at  Albany.  A  square  stone  porch,  whose 
tendrilled  arches  support  a  room  overhead,  is  the 
prominent  feature  of  the  south  front,  where  it 
protects  the  entrance,  and  above  this  is  a  tablet 
whose  Dutch  inscription  affirms  that  the  house 
was  erected  in  1656  and  reconstructed  by  Irving 
in  1835.  The  semi-detached  "  pagoda"  was  an 
afterthought  designed  by  Irving  to  hold  the 
kitchen  and  store-rooms  ;  its  graceful  cupola  yet 
upholds  the  vane  brought  from  Rotterdam  by  his 
friend,  "  the  King  of  Coney  Island,"  and  con 
tributes  picturesqueness  to  this  fa9ade.  The  old 
mansion  is  graced  and  garlanded  by  clambering 
vines  which  mount  upon  the  porches,  riot  along 
the  eaves,  cling  to  the  highest  gables,  and  so 
closely  mantle  the  walls  that  the  windows  seem 
to  be  carved  out  of  leafy  verdure, — wistaria  and 
honeysuckle  that  Irving  planted,  and  ivy  brought 
from  the  crumbling  ruins  of  the  holy  Melrose 
of  Scott's  "  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel"  and 
rooted  here  by  the  fair  hands  of  Irving's  inti 
mate  friend  Mrs.  Renwick,  the  "  Blue-eyed  Las 
sie"  of  one  of  Burns's  sweet  songs.  The  recent 
additions  to  Irving's  former  dwelling  conform 
in  design  and  finish  to  the  older  portions  of  the 
fabric,  and  aTe  so  disposed  that  they  are  scarcely 
noticeable  from  the  south  front,  which  is  usually 
pictured. 

176      . 


The  Rooms 

Within,  we  find  Irving's  snug  little  apart 
ments  changed  only  by  time  and  needed  reno 
vation,  and  still  simply  furnished  forth  with  the 
effects  he  placed  therein.  At  the  right  of  the 
little  tiled  hall-way  is  his  study ;  at  the  left, 
the  low-ceiled  drawing-room  with  its  antique 
mahogany  belongings  ;  beyond  is  his  dining- 
room,  from  whose  windows  we  survey  an  en 
trancing  picture  of  which  he  never  tired ;  we 
see  the  green  terrace  below,  the  majestic  river 
with  its  gleaming  tides  and  many  moving  craft, 
and  the  farther  verdant  hills  behind  which 
Irving,  standing  here  in  his  last  day  of  life, 
rapturously  watched  the  sun  go  down  in  crim 
son  splendor.  Above  the  study  is  his  bed 
chamber,  with  its  old  furniture,  where  we  may 
see  the  place  of  the  stand  upon  which  lay  for 
years  the  tenderly  cherished  Bible  and  Prayer- 
Book  of  his  lost  love,  Matilda  Hoffman,  of  the 
couch  upon  which  he  slept,  and  the  spot  at  its 
foot  where,  upon  a  placid  November  evening, 
with  a  faint  cry  of  pain,  he  fell  to  the  floor  as 
his  spirit  passed  to 

"  Those  everlasting  gardens 
Where  angels  walk  and  seraphs  are  the  warders." 

Adjoining  is  the  diminutive  "porch-room" 
in  which  his  nephew  and  biographer,  Pierre  M. 

12  177 


living's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

Irving,  lodged  to  be  within  call  of  his  uncle 
during  his  last  weeks ;  upon  the  opposite  side 
of  the  passage  is  the  long,  low  chamber  which 
was  then  occupied  by  Irving's  nieces,  and  the 
once  haunted  room  where,  according  to  Geoffrey 
Crayon,  the  young  lady  "  died  of  love  and  green 
apples." 

Most  interesting  of  the  apartments  is  the 
little  and  compact  library  which  was  for  so 
many  years  Irving's  sanctuary  and  workshop, 
and  in  which  the  great  author  wrote  some  of 
his  greatest  books.  Its  windows  look  upon 
sun-lit  lawn  and  shadowy  bosk ;  its  walls  are 
lined  with  bookshelves.  Opposite  to  the  fire 
place  stands  the  large,  plain  writing-table  which 
his  publisher  gave  him  in  exchange  for  the  old 
Dutch  desk  of  the  Knickerbocker  days ;  upon 
the  table  are  some  of  his  writing-implements, 
beneath  it  is  the  drawer  in  which  were  found, 
after  his  death,  the  sacred  relics  of  the  adored 
sweetheart  of  his  youth, — her  miniature,  a  tress 
of  her  fair  hair,  and  a  memorial  in  which  he 
told  the  tale  of  his  love  and  of  its  unhappy  end 
ing.  By  the  table  is  his  accustomed  seat,  the 
well-cushioned,  well-worn  "  Voltaire"  elbow 
chair  mentioned  in  his  letters  ;  the  shelves  are 
still  laden  with  his  books,  many  of  them  being 
choice  editions  of  the  writings  of  his  personal 
178 


The  Library 

friends  and  presented  by  them  ;  the  Jarvis  por 
trait  of  the  genius  loci  is  upon  the  wall,  and  a 
later  sculptured  effigy  of  him  stands  by  the 
window  and  with  stony  eyes  surveys  from  its 
pedestal  the  apartment,  where  the  adjuncts  and 
conveniences  of  Irving's  literary  work  remain 
so  little  changed  since  he  last  used  them  that  a 
recent  visitor  fancied  they  invited  the  effigy 
"  to  step  forth  and  take  up  the  magic  pen." 

In  this  hallowed  apartment,  according  to  the 
author's  grave  narrative,  Diedrich  Knicker 
bocker  deciphered  with  antiquarian  zeal  the 
venerable  Dutch  documents  whence  he  ex 
tracted  the  materials  for  the  marvellous  "  His 
tory  of  New  York,"  and  here  Irving  himself 
wrought  during  the  morning  hours  of  each  day 
and  produced  several  volumes, — among  others 
"  A  Tour  on  the  Prairies,"  "  Captain  Bonne- 
ville,"  "  The  Legend  of  the  Conquest  of 
Spain,"  "  Oliver  Goldsmith,"  "  Mahomet,"  and 
the  last  great  work  which  fittingly  closed  the 
labors  of  a  long  and  fruitful  career,  "  The  Life 
of  Washington,"  a  task  which  was  undertaken 
with  the  fear  that  he  might  not  live  to  com 
plete  it,  was  repeatedly  interrupted  by  failing 
health,  and  was  finally  completed  just  as  his 
ebbing  strength  gave  away. 

About  the  house  are  the  beautiful  grounds 
179 


Irving's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

which  Irving  planned  and  embellished.  A 
sweep  of  velvet  sward  extends  upon  every  side 
and  is  embraced  by  clustering  boughs  in  which 
his  "  Birds  of  Spring"  built  and  warbled  ;  great 
trees  that  he  planted  shelter  the  dwelling,  and 
the  sunbeams  filtering  through  their  foliage  fleck 
with  brightness  roof  and  wall.  Two  giant 
elms,  which  in  their  saplinghood  were  borne 
upon  Irving's  shoulder,  stand  upon  the  upper 
lawn,  and  frame  with  their  gothic  arches  a  view 
of  a  long  reach  of  the  beautiful  Tappan  Sea — 
once  the  haunt  of  the  Flying  Dutchman  of  his 
"  Chronicles ;"  out  of  the  foot  of  the  slope  at 
the  other  extremity  of  the  lawn  wells  the 
"  wizard  spring" — its  limpid  waters  protected 
now  by  a  covering  of  stone — which  the  prudent 
Flemmetie  Van  Blarcom  smuggled  across  the 
ocean  in  a  churn  from  her  former  home  in  Hol 
land,  and  beside  which  the  youthful  Geoffrey 
Crayon  sat  and  listened  to  the  legendary  lore  of 
Diedrich  Knickerbocker.  Past  the  spring  a 
rivulet  murmurs  musically  on  its  way  to  the 
river,  and  a  little  way  above  it  tumbles  through 
a  shaded  dell,  where  we  find,  recently  renewed, 
the  dam  which  Irving  built  among  his  "  other 
profane  improvements,"  and  the  lakelet  upon 
which  his  "  geese  sailed  like  frigates,  with  a 
whole  fleet  of  white  topknot  ducks."  Beyond, 
180 


The  Grounds — Noted  Visitors 

and  concealed  from  mansion  and  lawn  by  a 
grove,  is  the  garden  in  which  he  produced  his 
vegetables  "  at  very  little  more  than  twice  the 
market  price,"  and  where,  according  to  Irving's 
artist  friend  Richards,  grew  the  veritable  pumpkin 
which  the  Headless  Horseman  of  Sleepy  Hollow 
hurled  at  Ichabod  Crane.  The  grounds  are 
skilfully  planned  so  as  to  present  the  greatest 
diversity  of  picturesque  effects  in  mead  and  up 
land,  turf  and  wood,  terrace  and  ravine,  rock 
and  waterfall,  all  so  decked  and  adorned  with 
abundant  graces  of  leaf  and  flower  that  the 
whole  aspect  of  the  place,  in  its  beauty  and 
charm,  more  than  justifies  the  devotion  and 
praise  which  Irving  lavished  upon  it. 

In  this  retreat,  like  his  own  Wolfert  Acker, 
he  took  refuge  from  the  cares  and  troubles  of  the 
world,  and  for  twenty-three  years  of  his  blame 
less  life  the  quaint  little  cottage — always  "  well 
stocked  with  nieces" — was  his  idolized  home. 
To  this  spot  then  came  scores  of  visitors, — some 
times  a  dozen  in  a  day  :  besides  the  ubiquitous 
bores  and  tourists  "  doing  the  States,"  who  in 
cluded  Irving  and  his  abode  among  the  "  sights," 
there  were  more  welcome  visitors  to  whom 
Sunnyside  was  an  intellectual  Mecca, — Willis, 
Prescott,  Tuckerman,  Ripley,  Van  Bibber, 
Thackeray,  Cozzens,  Dr.  Holmes,  Ik  Marvel, 
181 


living's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

Louis  Napoleon  (whom  Irving  called  "  a  some 
what  quiet  guest"),  Lewis  Gaylord  Clark,  John 
P.  Kennedy  (the  "  gentle  Horseshoe"  of  Irving's 
letters),  Major  Jack  Downing,  James  the  novelist, 
and  others  like  them.  To  the  author  here  came 
unregarded  proffers  of  political  honors  :  a  seat  in 
Congress,  the  mayoralty  of  New  York  "  unani 
mously  and  vociferously"  offered  by  a  Tammany 
delegation,  a  place  in  President  Van  Buren's 
cabinet,  all  vainly  tempted  him  to  leave  this  be 
loved  spot ;  and  when  the  mission  to  Spain,  with 
its  obvious  literary  opportunities,  was  urged  upon 
him,  he  tore  himself  from  his  home  with  the 
greatest  reluctance.  His  letters  from  that  far 
away  land  to  his  nieces  here  teem  with  expres 
sions  of  his  love  for  his  "  darling  Sunnyside," 
"  dear  little  Sunnyside,"  with  eager  longings  to 
return  to  "  that  dear  little  spot,"  and  with  lamen 
tations  over  "  every  year  of  absence  from  his 
cottage."  In  other  letters  he  pictures  the  de 
lights  of  his  return  to  the  "  most  loving  home  to 
which  old  bachelor  ever  came,"  where  he  has 
"  but  to  walk  in,  hang  up  his  hat,  kiss  his  nieces, 
and  take  his  seat  in  his  elbow  chair  for  the  re 
mainder  of  his  life." 

About  this  spot  he  gracefully  wove  the  charm 
of  tradition  and  fancy.    In  his  veracious  "  Chroni 
cles"  it  was  the  seat  of  empire  of  the  wizard 
182 


Associations  with  Irving's  Books 

Sachem ;  later,  the  "  Roost"  of  Peter  Stuyve- 
sant's  hard-headed  privy  councillor,  Wolfert 
Acker ;  still  later,  the  stronghold  of  that  flagi 
tious  rebel  Jacob  Van  Tassel,  a  scene  of  pillage 
and  conflagration ;  and,  finally,  the  haunt  of 
Diedrich  Knickerbocker.  Irving's  friends  who 
wrote  about  this  place  during  his  lifetime  and 
after  visiting  him  here  were  assured  that,  in  his 
"  Legend  of  Sleepy  Hollow,"  this  was  the  home 
of  the  buxom  and  mischievous  heroine,  Katrina 
Van  Tassel,  the  scene  of  the  famous  "  quilting 
frolic"  and  of  Ichabod  Crane's  luckless  court 
ship.  For  nearly  four  decades  of  years  after 
Irving's  death  Sunnyside  was  inhabited  by  the 
nieces  to  whom  it  was  bequeathed  :  they  have 
recently  removed  to  New  York,  and  the  place 
has  passed  to  the  possession  of  a  grand-nephew, 
Alexander  Duer  Irving,  who  has  made  it  his 
permanent  residence,  thus  effectuating  the  desire 
expressed  in  the  author's  will  that  it  should 
"continue  to  be  an  Irving  homestead."  The 
area  of  the  grounds  is  enlarged  to  twenty-eight 
acres,  and  a  sumptuous  modern  mansion  now  ex 
pands  behind  Irving's  modest  nookery,  but  those 
portions  of  the  grounds  and  dwelling  which  he 
occupied  are  maintained  with  affectionate  care  so 
exactly  in  the  condition  he  knew  them  that  the 
atmosphere  of  the  place  seems  to  breathe  of  his 
183 


Irving's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

presence,  and,  remembering  his  prediction  that 
he  would  haunt  this  spot  after  death,  one  thrills 
with  the  vague  feeling  that  somehow  his  benefi 
cent  spirit  inhabits  it  still. 

Northward  from  Sunnyside  our  way  —  col 
umned  and  arched  by  noble  trees — lies  amid 
pleasant  landscapes  which,  although  now 
"  combed  and  curled"  to  the  extreme  of  pres 
ent  fashion,  are  still  permeated  by  associations 
with  Irving  and  suffused  with  the  light  of  his 
genius.  His  memory  has  in  some  measure  con 
strained  modern  enterprise  to  spare  objects  and 
places  which  were  connected  with  his  life  or 
were  made  the  scenes  of  his  charming  fancies. 

The  ancient  "  Tarry  Town"  of  his  popular 
legend — replete  with  traditions  and  historic 
reminiscences — has  expanded  into  a  beautiful 
and  progressive  modern  town,  where  we  yet 
find  the  old  brick  church  in  which  Irving  so 
long  worshipped  and  where,  as  warden,  he 
decorously  presented  the  plate  for  the  offerings 
of  the  parishioners.  A  marble  in  commemora 
tion  of  the  author  is  set  in  the  front  of  the 
edifice,  and  ivy  from  Melrose  and  Sunnyside 
clambers  upon  the  walls.  His  pew,  which  was 
No.  26,  the  fourth  from  the  front,  has  been  re 
moved  a  few  feet  from  its  place  and  is  carefully 
184 


Tarrytown — living's  Church 

preserved  in  the  baptistery,  beneath  a  beautiful 
mural  tablet  which  bears  a  memorial  inscription 
and  the  Irving  coat  of  arms.  Some  are  still 
living  who  saw  Irving  in  this  pew  on  his  last 
Sabbath  of  life,  appearing  unwontedly  pale  and 
feeble,  and  who  remember  that,  after  the  service 
that  day,  he  hurried  away  without  the  usual 
greeting  to  his  neighbors.  The  present  venera 
ble  rector  served  him  in  holy  things  and  was 
one  of  the  ministrants  at  his  funeral  in  this 
church,  where  Bancroft,  Willis,  Duyckinck, 
Verplanck,  Tuckerman,  Cozzens,  and  many 
others  of  the  guild  of  letters  were  in  attend 
ance  and  a  great,  thronging  tide  of  friends  and 
mourners  streamed  past  his  coffin,  as  it  lay  here 
before  the  altar,  to  look  for  the  last  time  upon 
the  face  of  him  who  was  the  "  morning  star  of 
American  letters." 

The  course  of  Irving's  funeral  procession 
follows  that  of  Ichabod  Crane's  memorable  ride 
and  leads  northward  past  the  site  of  the  famous 
tulip-tree,  and  past  the  monument  which  com 
memorates  the  capture  of  the  unfortunate  Major 
Andre,  and  which,  for  the  literary  pilgrim, 
marks  the  spot  where  the  "  huge,  misshapen, 
black,  and  towering"  apparition  of  the  Head 
less  Horseman  first  appeared  to  the  affrighted 
pedagogue.  The  old  Mott  homestead,  which 
185 


Irving's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

some  in  the  village  have  believed  was  the  home 
of  Katrina  Van  Tassel,  has  recently  given  place 
to  the  High  School  building.  The  bridge, 
grove,  and  swamp  of  the  legend,  as  well  as  the 
tulip-tree  which  Irving  knew,  have  long  ago 
disappeared,  and  the  diminished  brook  itself  is 
so  concealed  in  a  conduit  beneath  the  highway 
that  one  might  pass  it  unaware.  A  little  way 
beyond,  the  road  which  Crane's  stubborn  steed, 
Gunpowder,  refused  to  take  diverges  to  the 
right  and  conducts  us  across  the  hills  to  the 
mystic  precincts  of  the  "  Sleepy  Hollow"  of 
the  tale. 

We  find  the  little  valley  somewhat  more 
populous  and  threatened  with  some  perturbing 
changes,  but  still  essentially  the  same  quiet  and 
slumbrous  lap  of  land  which  Irving  knew  and 
whimsically  lauded.  The  old  school-house  of 
his  time  has  been  demolished,  its  massive  oaken 
timbers  being  incorporated  into  the  structure  of 
its  successor  which  stands  a  few  rods  distant 
from  the  present  school,  but  there  yet  remain 
old-fashioned  Dutch  farmsteads,  with  hipped 
roofs  and  low,  projecting  eaves,  where  Irving's 
pedagogue  might  have  sojourned  while  "  board 
ing  round,"  or  where  he  might  have  borrowed 
the  ancient,  ewe-necked,  hammer-headed  charger 
which  he  bestrode  on  the  night  of  his  eventful 
186 


Scenes  of  Sleepy  Hollow  Legend 

encounter  with  the  ghostly  Hessian.  Tall  trees 
still  shade  the  hill-sides  where  the  spell-bound 
Sachem  of  Sing-Sing  sleeps  with  his  warriors, 
and  where  Irving  hunted  squirrels  during  his 
early  visits  to  this  secluded  spot,  and  the  stream 
in  which  he  first  essayed  his  unskilled  hand  at 
angling  yet  glides  through  the  valley  "  with 
just  murmur  enough  to  lull  one  to  repose." 
Here,  too,  we  may  find  the  ruins  of  a  goblin- 
looking  pile,  once  the  haunted  and  time-worn 
old  mill  of  Geoffrey  Crayon's  "  Chronicles," 
which  he  visited  with  the  historian  of  the  Man- 
hattoes,  Diedrich  Knickerbocker,  and  where 
that  worthy  obtained,  from  the  hobgoblin  old 
negro  miller,  his  greatest  treasure  of  historic 
lore, — the  immortal  "  Legend  of  Sleep  Hol 
low."  In  the  same  quiet  vicinage  is  the  farm 
where,  above  a  hundred  years  ago,  lived  a  Van 
Tassel  who  bore,  throughout  the  countryside, 
the  sobriquet  of  "  Brom  Bones,"  which  Irving 
afterwards  bestowed  upon  the  roystering  hero 
of  the  legend. 

Past  the  Andre  monument,  we  may  approxi 
mately  follow  the  course  over  which  the  frenzied 
Ichabod  was  pursued  by  the  spectral  trooper 
from  the  main  highway,  "  down  the  hill  to  the 
left,"  and  onward  to  the  scene  of  the  final 
catastrophe  at  the  "  bridge  famous  in  goblin 
187 


living's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

story."  The  last  furlong  of  the  present  road 
lies  nearer  to  the  site  of  the  old  mill-pond  and 
some  rods  to  the  left  of  the  thickly  shaded  way 
along  which  the  school-master  fled,  and  a  grace 
ful  bridge  of  stone  and  brick  now  arches  the 
Pocantico  instead  of  the  storied  structure  of  the 
legend.  A  little  above  the  present  bridge  we 
find  the  place  of  the  old  fabric  whose  planks 
resounded  with  the  thunder  of  Gunpowder's 
hoofs,  and  the  spot  where  his  terrified  rider  was 
tumbled  headlong  into  the  dust  by  the  impact 
of  the  pumpkin  hurled  by  the  Headless  Horse 
man.  This  favorite  haunt  of  the  goblin  was 
well  chosen,  at  a  point  where  the  stream  ran 
deep  and  black  in  a  gloomy  dell,  overhung  by 
dark  hemlocks  which  shut  out  the  heaven  and 
made  the  spot,  even  at  mid-day,  suggestively  dis 
mal.  A  little  distance  below,  a  morass  now  re 
places  the  mill-pond  of  Irving's  time,  but  the 
drooping  willows  which  hemmed  its  banks,  and 
beneath  which  Ichabod  used  to  saunter  with  a 
bevy  of  country  damsels  between  the  services 
in  the  little  Dutch  church,  still  remain  in  their 
graceful  beauty  and  tenderly  shelter  the  moss- 
covered  old  mill  and  the  refashioned  "  Castle" 
of  the  ancient  and  once  mighty  family  of  the 
Philipses. 

From  the  bridge  the  road  winds  up  a  hill- side 
1 88 


Ancient  Sleepy  Hollow  Church 

to  the  green  knoll  where,  still  shaded  by  trees 
which  Irving  knew,  stands  the  quaint  Sleepy 
Hollow  church  which  he  rendered  famous. 
The  sturdy,  rough-walled  edifice  was  already 
old,  as  we  count  age,  before  Irving's  time, 
having  been  erected  in  the  seventeenth  century 
by  the  first  Lord  of  Philipsburg,  who  now 
sleeps  beneath  its  floor.  The  ancient  record- 
book  shows  that  the  Wolfert  Ecker  (Acker)  of 
Irving's  "  Wolfert's  Roost"  was  one  of  the 
original  deacons  (diakenen)  of  this  church,  and 
that  a  Jacob  Van  Tassel,  who  sometime  owned 
what  is  now  Sunnyside,  held  the  same  office 
about  the  time  when  Geoffrey  Crayon's 
"  Chronicles"  tell  us  he  was  so  effectively  using 
his  goose  gun  against  the  British  on  the  Tappan 
Sea.  Some  of  the  galleries  of  the  ancient  fane 
were  long  ago  removed,  as  well  as  the  rude 
corner  benches  for  the  slaves  and  the  curtained 
and  cushioned  thrones  beside  the  pulpit  upon 
which  the  lordly  Philipses  used  to  sit  during 
the  service ;  but  the  more  recent  work  upon  the 
edifice  has  been  more  of  the  nature  of  replace 
ment,  and  has  measuredly  restored  it  to  the  con 
dition  in  which  it  was  when  its  old  walls  re 
sounded  with  the  quavers  of  Ichabod  Crane's 
nasal  melody,  and  the  elders  slumbered  through 
the  sermon  "with  their  handkerchiefs  over 
189 


Irving's  Sunnyside  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

their  faces  to  keep  off  the  flies."  The  original 
ceiling  has  been  replaced,  and  the  old-fashioned 
high  pulpit,  set  like  a  tulip  upon  its  stem,  has 
been  reproduced  with  its  winding  stair  on  one 
side,  and  with  a  great  sounding-board  threaten 
ingly  suspended  above  it  from  the  beams  of  the 
ceiling.  The  diminutive  bell,  brought  from 
Holland,  still  swings  in  its  curious  open  tower, 
and  upon  the  roof  yet  perch  the  antique  Dutch 
weather-cocks  between  which  "  there  was  a 
perpetual  contradiction  on  all  points  of  windy 
doctrine." 

Just  without  these  ancient  walls  was  the 
reputed  burial-place  of  the  body  of  the  Head 
less  Horseman,  whence  he  made  his  nightly 
excursions  in  quest  of  his  head,  and  here  we 
find,  side  by  side  in  long  platoons,  the  grass- 
grown  graves  of  many  generations  of  the  dead. 
Upon  crumbling  tombstones,  decked  with  quaint 
scrolls  and  with  rude  sculptures  of  fat  Dutch 
cherubim,  we  read  the  half-effaced  records  of 
the  names  and  virtues  of  these  lowly  sleepers 
that  Diedrich  Knickerbocker  deciphered  with 
such  pious  care.  Among  the  many  memorials 
of  the  Van  Tassels  we  look  half  expectantly  for 
the  names  of  the  good-humored  Baltus  and  his 
blooming  daughter. 

Higher  up  on  that  sun-kissed  southern  slope, 
190 


Cemetery — living's  Grave 

in  the  midst  of  what  is  now  a  beautiful  modern 
cemetery,  is  the  spot  which,  years  before  his 
death,  Irving  selected  and  prepared  for  his  sep 
ulchre.  In  a  letter  from  Spain  he  directed  his 
brother  to  purchase  the  plot ;  after  his  return  he 
set  the  railing  and  hedge  which  enclose  it  and 
brought  to  it  the  remains  of  his  dead  kindred, 
marking  out  for  his  own  grave  the  space  by  his 
mother's  side,  where,  as  he  said,  "I  hope  to  sleep 
my  last  sleep  in  that  favorite  resort  of  my  boy 
hood,  where  my  dust  may  mingle  with  the  dust 
of  those  most  dear  to  me."  To  this  spot  the 
body  of  the  beloved  author,  followed  by  a  great 
concourse  of  friends,  was  borne  one  bright 
Indian  summer  day  when  all  the  countryside  was 
flooded  with  sunshine,  and  tenderly  laid  to  rest. 
The  memorial  slab  which  now  marks  his  grave, 
and  replaces  other  stones  that  had  been  muti 
lated  by  relic-hunters,  is  as  modest  as  was  Ir- 
ving's  life,  and  bears  no  eulogistic  inscription ; 
the  well-worn  path  that  leads  to  his  resting-place 
is  a  more  eloquent  tribute  to  his  worth  than 
could  be  any  costly  monument  or  superlative 
epitaph. 

The  same  hill-side  holds  now  the  grave  of 

Irving's    friend,    the    historian    and    litterateur, 

Duyckinck.      It    is,   indeed,   a   beautiful    spot : 

southward,  the  sightly  slope  commands  enchant- 

191 


Irving's  Sunny  side  and  Sleepy  Hollow 

ing  views  of  the  lordly  river  which  Irving  loved 
and  glorified  ;  westward  it  overlooks  the  green 
valley  of  his  legend  ;  at  its  foot  flows  his  own 
romantic  Pocantico,  and  all  about  it  lie  scenes 
which  his  presence  has  consecrated  and  his  genius 
has  made  immortal. 


192 


KIPLING,  HARTFORD  AU 
THORS,  ETC.:  A  CONNECTI 
CUT  RIVER  PILGRIMAGE 

The  Hartford  Wits-Hartford  Literary  Shrines- Whittier- 
Mrs.  Sigourney  —  Mrs.  Slosson  —  Mark  Twain—  Charles 
Dudley  Warner— Mrs.  Stowe-Bancroft- -Holland-Bel 
lamy  —  Northampton  —  Cable  —  Brattleboro—Miss  Wilkins, 
etc^-Kipling  Abodes  and  Environs-Recollections  of  Kip 
ling  —  His  Character ,  Work,  and  Recreations  —  Eugene 
Field. 

THE  course  of  a  Bryant  pilgrimage  has 
brought  us  into  the  beautiful  valley 
through  which  the  Connecticut,  the  noble 
"  River  of  Pines,"  winds  on  its  way  to  the  sea. 
From  the  broad  lowlands  near  the  Sound,  where 
we  find  the  delightful  home  which  Donald  G. 
Mitchell  (Ik  Marvel)  has  inhabited  for  forty 
years,  and  has  made  famous  as  "  My  Farm  at 
Edgewood,"  to  the  clustering  hills  which  closely 
border  the  northern  reaches  of  the  river,  we 
ramble  through  a  region  long  loved  by  many  of 
our  litterateurs  who  have  here  found  homes  and 
themes. 

Among  the  shrines  which  appeal  most  strongly 

to  the  lettered  pilgrim  are  those  of  Hartford, — 

the  beautiful  city  of  the  Charter  Oak, — which 

has  for  a   century   been   a   literary  centre.      Its 

13  J93 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

prominence  began  in  the  days  of  the  famous 
"  Hartford  wits,"  and  the  older  portion  of  the 
city  has  its  precious  associations  with  Trumbull, 
Barlow,  Dwight,  Hopkins,  Brainard,  Alsop, 
Goodrich,  Noah  Webster,  as  well  as  with  more 
recent  authors.  As  we  stroll  the  older  streets 
we  find  the  sometime  home  of  George  D.  Pren 
tice  ;  the  seminary  where  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe 
and  Rose  Terry  Cooke  were  once  pupils  ;  the 
church  and  pew — marked  now  by  a  tablet  with 
its  eulogistic  inscription  by  Whittier  —  where 
Lydia  Huntley  Sigourney  worshipped  ;  the  In 
sane  Retreat  depicted  in  Dickens's  "  American 
Notes  ;"  the  site  of  the  school  where  Gail 
Hamilton  taught ;  the  place  of  the  birth  of 
Edmund  C.  Stedman.  A  business  structure  at 
the  corner  of  Grove  and  Main  Streets  displaces 
the  two-storied  brick  house  where  John  Green- 
leaf  Whittier — then  a  "  shy  lad  in  homespun 
clothes  of  Quaker  cut,"  as  he  described  himself 
— lived  when  he  published  his  first  volume  of 
verse,  and  edited  the  New  England  Review  in  a 
building  which  then  stood  a  little  above  the  old 
State  House.  In  the  yellow  files  of  this  old 
paper,  preserved  at  the  near-by  Athenaeum,  we 
find  "  Christ  in  the  Tempest"  and  many  others 
of  Whittier's  earlier  poems,  including  several 
which  have  not  appeared  in  any  collection. 
194 


Hartford's  Literary  Shrines 

Westward  from  the  heart  of  the  city  is  the 
embowered  and  sedately  old-fashioned  dwelling 
of  Mrs.  Annie  T.  Slosson,  author  of  "  Seven 
Dreamers"  and  other  clever  tales  of  New  Eng 
land  life,  and  nearer  the  railway,  and  overlooking 
the  park  and  a  wide  area  of  the  city,  stands  the 
imposing  edifice  which  was  for  many  years  the 
home  of  the  poet,  Mrs.  Sigourney,  and  a  local 
focus  and  pharos  of  literary  and  social  culture. 
Modern  municipal  encroachments  have  reduced 
the  magnificent  grounds  which  once  environed 
the  mansion  to  a  few  rods  of  sward  standing 
high  above  the  grade  ot  a  street  excavated  just 
by  the  door,  but  the  narrow  green  retains  a  few 
of  the  old  trees,  and  the  mansion  itself  is  scarcely 
changed.  It  is  an  ample,  large-roomed,  high- 
ceiled  fabric,  with  wings  projecting  from  either 
side  and  a  noble  portico  upheld  by  lofty  columns 
in  front,  occupied  now  as  a  sanitarium.  To  this 
house,  then  almost  palatial  in  its  appointments, 
the  gifted  and  graceful  poet  was  brought  as  a 
bride ;  here  she  passed  the  most  o/f  her  life  and, 
in  a  room  which  looked  out  from  behind  the 
white  columns  upon  an  entrancing  and  extensive 
prospect,  wrote  most  of  her  fifty-seven  volumes 
of  prose  and  verse. 

Some  furlongs  beyond  is  the  beautifully  diver 
sified  suburban  neighborhood  of  Nook  Farm  with 
195 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

its  notable  literary  colony.  Upon  a  grassy  knoll 
by  Farmington  Avenue  one  of  our  most  popu 
lar  living  writers,  Samuel  L.  Clemens  (Mark 
Twain),  has  erected  his  house, — an  irregular, 
multi-gabled,  multi-chimneyed  edifice  of  divers- 
colored  bricks.  The  bricks  being  laid  in  fanci 
ful  courses  and  at  various  angles  produce  an  effect 
at  once  striking  and  distinctive,  which  the  em 
bowering  vines  and  foliage  render  altogether 
pleasing.  An  undulating  lawn  dotted  with  fine 
trees  slopes  towards  the  Avenue,  and  about  two 
sides  of  the  house  cluster  great  forest  trees, — 
members  of  a  wood  which  clothes  a  steep  de 
clivity  falling  away  from  the  house  to  the  little 
Park  River,  which  winds  lazily  along  the  margin 
of  a  meadow  close  by.  The  kitchen  (an  after 
thought)  is  in  front  of  the  house ;  a  broad 
ombra  is  at  the  back  ;  and  between  these  are 
handsome  and  spacious  apartments,  with  rich 
wood  panels  and  wide  fireplaces,  embellished  by 
many  articles  of  furniture  and  bric-a-brac  which 
are  the  spoils  of  years  of  foreign  travel.  In 
these  rooms  the  great  humorist  and  his  charm 
ing  wife — sister  of  the  Dan  of  "  Innocents 
Abroad" — have  entertained  many  of  the  fore 
most  of  his  contemporaries  in  literature.  Mr. 
Clemens  first  fitted  up  a  study  above  the  hand 
some  library,  but  its  alluring  outlook  so  much 
196 


Home  of  Mark  Twain 

distracted  him  from  his  literary  tasks  that  he  ap 
propriated  a  corner  of  the  billiard-room  on  the 
third  floor  for  his  workshop,  and  there  we  find 
his  writing-table,  chair,  and  a  few  shelves  of 
books.  In  this  retreat  among  the  tree-tops  much 
of  his  literary  work  has  been  done,  including  por 
tions,  at  least,  of  "  The  Prince  and  the  Pauper," 
"  Huckleberry  Finn,"  "  A  Connecticut  Yankee 
in  King  Arthur's  Court,"  "  Life  on  the  Mis 
sissippi,"  and  many  other  stories  and  sketches. 

The  former  residence  of  Mrs.  Isabella  Beecher 
Hooker,  a  rambling  Gothic  cottage  set  in  ample 
grounds  and  shaded  by  noble  trees,  just  out  of 
Forest  Street,  was  the  dwelling  of  Mark  Twain 
for  three  or  four  years  before  he  erected  his 
present  home,  and  to  that  period  belong  "  Tom 
Sawyer,"  "  The  Gilded  Age,"  etc.  "  Rough 
ing  It"  was  produced  in  the  house  of  his  pub 
lisher,  Mr.  Bliss,  in  Asylum  Avenue.  His  latest 
works  have  been  written  abroad  during  the  pro 
longed  exile  in  which  he  is  bravely  and  success 
fully  struggling  to  retrieve  his  fallen  fortunes,  his 
home  meantime  being  in  charge  of  a  gardener, 
who  maintains  house  and  grounds  in  the  perfect 
order  in  which  Mr.  Clemens  left  them. 

In  the  fair  woodland  which  adjoins  on  the 
south  is  the  delightful  residence  of  Charles  Dad- 
ley  Warner.  Upon  the  one  hand  his  grounds 
197 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

decline  steeply  to  the  riveret  and  meadow,  upon 
the  other  hand  an  expanse  of  level  lawn  extends 
to  the  distant  street,  and  upon  every  side  of  the 
dwelling  stand  grand  forest  monarchs  with  wide- 
reaching  branches  and  abundant  foliage.  The 
house  is  of  imposing  dimensions,  with  wide 
verandas  and  bays,  and  with  picturesque  gables 
and  dormers  in  its  steep  roofs.  Spacious  rooms 
lie  upon  either  side  of  a  central  hall,  whence 
broad  stairs  lead  to  the  author's  workroom  in 
one  of  the  high  gables.  Through  the  cheerful 
apartments  are  artistically  arranged  a  wealth  of 
curios  and  bric-a-brac  which  Mr.  Warner  has 
gathered  in  his  several  tours  abroad,  pieces  of 
antique  pottery  being  especially  notable.  A  red 
wood  mantel-piece  in  the  music-room  is  set  with 
Saracenic  tiles — some  bearing  Arabic  legends — 
brought  from  the  Alhambra,  the  Mosque  of 
Omar,  and  ancient  edifices  of  Cairo  and  far 
Damascus ;  near  by  hangs,  in  unique  frame  of 
ebony  and  tortoise-shell,  the  "  Martyrdom  of 
Santa  Barbara,"  painted  by  Vasquez  in  1 540,  and 
upon  every  hand  we  see  articles  of  similar  in 
terest  or  value.  Books  abound  everywhere, — in 
the  rooms,  in  the  halls,  on  the  landings  ;  in  the 
third-story  study  they  are  profusely  disposed 
upon  shelves,  tables,  cases,  and  yet  so  methodi 
cally  that  the  genial  author,  who  sits  among 
198 


Residence  of  Charles  Dudley  Warner 

them  to  write  the  charming  works  which  all  the 
world  reads,  instantly  finds  any  desired  volume. 
This  study  is  a  bright  and  cheery  chamber 
among  the  birds  and  branches :  opposite  its 
western  window,  from  which  he  looks  through 
the  boughs  and  across  an  undulating  expanse  to 
the  Talcott  Mountain,  Warner  works  for  some 
hours  of  each  morning  upon  his  literary  occupa 
tions.  Here  he  has  written  "  Their  Pilgrim 
age,"  "A  Little  Journey  in  the  World,"  "Our 
Italy,"  "  The  Golden  House,"  and  much  more 
beside  his  contributions  to  the  "  Library  of  the 
World's  Best  Literature." 

A  homelet  which  will  completely  win  the 
heart  of  the  pilgrim  is  that  which  Warner  occu 
pied  in  the  days  of  his  "  Summer  in  a  Garden" 
and  "  Back-log  Studies," — books  which  many 
yet  regard  as  the  most  enjoyable  of  his  produc 
tions.  It  is  a  little  Gothic  cottage  of  red  brick, 
standing  near  by  amid  arboring  evergreens  and 
shrubbery  ;  at  one  side  is  a  ravine  overhung  by 
forest  trees,  at  the  back  lies  the  garden  he  made 
famous — now  a  green  stretch  of  sward  flecked 
with  fruit-trees  and  bordered  by  masses  of  foliage. 
In  the  pretty  drawing-room  at  the  left  of  the 
entrance  is  the  fireplace  which  inspired  his 
"  Back-log  Studies,"  and  behind  it  the  con 
servatory  and  the  place  where,  "  on  the  brightest 
199 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

spot  of  a  Smyrna  rug,"  died  the  cat  "  Calvin," 
— a  present  from  Mrs.  Stowe,  and  the  subject 
of  one  of  Mr.  Warner's  most  exquisite  sketches. 
In  a  little  attic-room,  whose  single  window  looks 
out  upon  the  scene  of  his  labors  and  cogitations 
in  the  garden,  he  wrote  the  books  which  made 
his  fame,  with  "  Calvin"  often  sitting  upon  the 
table  watching  his  pen  or  sleeping  among  the 
papers  by  the  inkstand.  Besides  the  works 
already  mentioned,  he  here  produced  "  In  the 
Wilderness,"  and  portions  of  books  of  Oriental 
travel,  and  wrote  "  The  Gilded  Age"  in  collab 
oration  with  Mr.  Clemens,  who  then  resided 
just  across  the  street. 

Opposite  to  Mr.  Warner's  present  abode  is 
that  of  his  brother,  and  the  sojourn  of  the  noted 
dramatist,  William  E.  Gillette,  with  the  pic 
turesque  shingle-clad  cottage  of  Richard  Burton, 
the  versatile  author,  poet,  and  critic,  adjoining 
on  the  east. 

But  a  few  rods  distant  on  the  same  tree-lined 
street  is  the  pleasant  house  in  which  the  most 
famous  of  American  women  and  author  of  the 
most  widely-read  tale  of  modern  times,  Harriet 
Beecher  Stowe,  passed  her  declining  years  of 
life.  Through  a  well-kept  lawn,  set  with  shrub 
bery  and  bright  with  flowers,  a  curving  path 
conducts  to  a  Gothic  porch  which  protects  the 
200 


Where  Mrs.  Stowe  Lived 

entrance  to  the  cottage, — an  attractive,  home-like 
structure  of  moderate  dimensions.  A  pretty 
gable  rises  from  its  centre  roof,  dormers  look 
out  upon  either  side,  its  brick  walls  are  painted 
a  modest  hue,  its  front  windows  face  the  sunrise. 
Tastefully-furnished  rooms  flank  the  entrance 
upon  either  side,  pleasant  parlors  and  a  cheer 
ful  dining-room.  The  apartment  at  the  right 
was,  in  Mrs.  Stowe's  time,  a  combined  sitting- 
room  and  library,  in  which  many  distinguished 
visitors  were  received.  From  these  rooms  have 
been  recently  removed  the  treasured  effects 
of  the  world-renowned  writer,  her  furniture, 
books,  paintings,  portraits,  testimonials,  many 
priceless  souvenirs  of  her  noble  life  and  of 
her  marvellous  achievements.  Above  is  the 
room  in  which  she  penned  most  of  the  works 
produced  during  her  twenty-three  years'  resi 
dence  here,  among  them  being  "  We  and  Our 
Neighbors,"  "A  Dog's  Mission,"  and  "  Poganuc 
People ;"  with  the  latter,  a  popular  representa 
tion  of  New  England  lives  and  loves,  practically 
ended  her  literary  career,  and  here  she  wrote 
her  last  page  and  laid  down  her  pen  never  to 
take  it  again.  In  this  upper  chamber,  too, 
she  tranquilly  expired,  lingering  several  years 
after  her  husband,  who  died  in  the  same  room 
and  upon  the  same  bed.  Until  a  few  months 
201 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

ago  the  house  was  occupied  by  the  daughters 
who  here  ministered  to  her  in  her  age  and  de 
cadence  with  untiring  love,  and  who  would  have 
preserved  unaltered  her  home  and  its  many  me 
mentos.  The  changes  wrought  by  the  present 
occupant  have  been  mainly  renovations  and  re- 
decorations,  which  leave  the  dimensions  and 
arrangement  of  the  rooms  the  same  as  when 
Mrs.  Stowe  inhabited  them. 

A  sadder  fate  has  befallen  the  once  beautiful 
home  which  Mrs.  Stowe  previously  inhabited  at 
Glenwood,  half  a  mile  distant.  Most  of  the 
noble  grove,  which  was  a  beloved  resort  of  her 
girlhood  and  drew  her  back  years  afterwards  to 
dwell  in  this  spot,  has  been  destroyed  ;  the  trees 
and  shrubs  she  rooted  have  yielded  to  the  spoiler; 
the  lawn  and  garden  she  planted  have  almost  dis 
appeared  beneath  factories  and  warehouses,  and 
the  pathetic  remnants  of  leaf  and  blade  are 
assoiled  by  dust  and  soot.  The  picturesque 
gabled  dwelling  she  designed  and  built  has  been 
robbed  of  its  fair  piazzas  and  pretty  bay-win 
dows  and  degraded  into  a  storage-house  for  the 
huge  factory  which  now  jostles  and  overshadows 
it.  To  Mrs.  Stowe  within  these  now  dishonored 
walls  came  from  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  scores 
of  the  most  eminent  literators  and  reformers  of 
her  time,  and  here  she  received  tidings  of  the 


Mrs.  Stowe's  "  Glenwood" — Bellamy 

final  overthrow  of  the  institution  against  which 
her  first  great,  glowing  tale  was  directed.  In  a 
spacious  room  at  the  right,  whose  windows  are 
barricaded  with  rough  boards  and  whose  floor  is 
heaped  high  with  refuse  irons  and  worn-out  ma 
chinery,  were  written  several  of  her  thirty-six 
volumes,  including  "  Pink  and  White  Tyranny," 
the  much  discussed  and  denounced  "  History  of 
the  Byron  Controversy,"  and  the  "  Oldtown 
Folks,"  which  has  been  classed  among  her  great 
books  and  was  a  pioneer  in  a  field  which  has 
since  been  faithfully  tilled.  Here,  too,  her  hus 
band — the  original  visionary  boy  of  "  Oldtown 
Folks,"  whose  youthful  experiences  were  em 
bodied  in  her  "  Oldtown  Fireside  Stories" — 
wrote  the  erudite  "  Origin  and  History  of  the 
Books  of  the  New  Testament." 

If  our  way  follow  the  windings  of  the  brim 
ming  river  northward  from  Hartford  towards 
the  more  remote  and  picturesque  portions  of  the 
valley,  we  visit  the  Springfield  home  of  Bancroft, 
the  sightly  "  Brightwood"  of  Dr.  Holland,  with 
its  delightful  associations,  and  find  beyond  these 
the  quiet  factory  village  of  Chicopee  Falls, — the 
birthplace  of  Edward  Bellamy  and  the  home 
where  he  lived  almost  all  of  his  life,  including 
the  years  in  which  he  gave  to  the  world  such 
tales  as  "Dr.  Heidenhoff's  Process,"  "Miss 


20- 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

Ludington's  Sister,"  and  that  great  fictional  ex 
ploitation  of  socialism  "  Looking  Backward," 
with  its  later  elaboration  in  the  more  disquisi- 
tive  "  Equality."  Upon  an  elm-shaded  hill, 
overlooking  the  valley,  stands  the  Bellamy 
homestead — a  plain,  two-storied,  clap-boarded 
structure  with  a  broad  piazza  along  the  front, 
arbored  by  wide-spreading  branches  and  pleas 
antly  girt  by  garden  and  lawn.  Here  he  enter 
tained  many  men  of  lettered  culture  and,  in  later 
years,  many  more  of  the  advocates  of  social  re 
form  from  both  sides  of  the  sea.  Following 
the  completion  of  his  last  book,  "  Equality," 
failing  health  necessitated  a  sojourn  in  the  far 
West,  whence  he  returned  not  many  months  ago 
to  die  in  the  beloved  house  of  his  birth  and 
mingle  his  ashes  with  those  of  his  kindred. 

Beyond  lies  Northampton,  which  Harriet 
Martineau  praised  as  the  most  beautiful  of  New 
England  villages,  Holland  celebrated  as  the 
"  Queen  village  of  the  meads,"  and  Beecher 
extolled  as  the  lovely  scene  of  his  novel  of 
"  Norwood."  Here  still  flourishes  the  peri 
odical  in  which  Bryant's  first  poems  appeared, 
and  under  the  arching  elms,  and  among  the 
pretty  gardens  overlooked  by  the  peaks  of  Tom 
and  Holyoke,  we  find  the  place  of  Jonathan 
Edwards's  abode  during  the  years  in  which  his 
204 


Holland — Bancroft — Cable 

reputation  was  won  ;  the  charming,  vine-cov 
ered  dwelling  where  George  W.  Cable  wrote 
"Strange  True  Stories  of  Louisiana"  and  most  of 
that  prose  pastoral  "  Bonaventure  ;"  the  Smith 
College,  which  Barrie,  the  inventor  of"  Thrums," 
thought  the  "  most  splendid  thing  in  America." 
The  eminence  of  Round  Hill,  with  its  enchant 
ing  prospect  of  mead  and  mountain,  embowered 
town,  and  foliage-fringed  river,  still  holds  the 
house  in  which  Bancroft  lived,  where  we  may 
see  the  little  library  in  which  he  began  the 
great  history  and  translated  his  friend  Heeren's 
"  Politics  of  Ancient  Greece,"  and  here,  too, 
remains  the  edifice  in  which  "  the  Swedish 
Nightingale"  spent  her  honeymoon  and  the 
sweet  poet,  Alice  Cary,  passed  a  portion  of  her 
last  year  of  life. 

In  the  delightful  suburb  which  Mr.  Cable  has 
named  "Dryad's  Green"  the  writer  of  the 
"  Grandissimes,"  which  some  have  considered 
the  best  American  novel,  has  erected  the  spa 
cious,  broad-verandaed,  colonial  frame  house 
which  for  five  years  has  been  his  home.  It 
stands  upon  a  terrace  at  the  margin  of  its  own 
acres  of  beautiful  woodland,  and  its  upper  win 
dows  have  a  supurb  outlook  upon  the  heights 
of  Mount  Tom  and  Mount  Holyoke,  with 
glimpses  of  the  shining  river  which  flows  be- 
205 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

tween  and  the  hazy  outlines  of  the  farther 
Hampshire  hills  among  which  the  poet  of 
"  Thanatopsis"  was  born  and  reared.  Of 
the  tastefully  finished  and  furnished  apartments 
which  Cable's  home,  "  Tarryawhile,"  affords, 
his  study  is  for  us  the  most  interesting  :  it  lies 
at  the  right  of  the  old-fashioned  entrance,  and 
abounds  with  books,  papers,  and  pictures,  among 
which  the  master,  when  at  home,  sits  in  his 
rocking-chair  busied  with  his  literary  tasks. 
Here  "John  March,  Southerner,"  was  written 
and  much  worthy  work  has  since  been  done. 

Farther  afield  are  Hadley,  which  has  been  so 
delightfully  embalmed  in  Holland's  verse,  and 
Greenfield,  the  birthplace  and  early  home  of  the 
critic  and  literator,  George  Ripley,  who  was 
the  leader  in  what  Carlyle  called  the  "  Potato- 
Gospel"  experiment  at  Brook-Farm,  and  farther 
still  we  find  picturesque  Brattleboro  and  the 
American  home  of  the  great  "  Avatar  of  Vish- 
nuland,"  Rudyard  Kipling. 

The  village  is  redolent  of  literary  memories. 
Upon  its  tree-shaded  terraces  that  rise  steeply 
from  the  river-bank  are  old  houses  which  have 
been  associated  with  Mrs.  Stowe  and  Mrs.  Par- 
ton  and  other  writers  of  their  time ;  here,  too, 
are  the  plain,  two-storied  dwelling  in  which  the 
wife  of  William  Dean  Howells  grew  to  woman- 
206 


Miss  Wilkins — Kipling 

hood  and  the  hill-side  tenement  in  which  the  now 
famous  author  of  "  Pembroke"  and  "Jerome," 
Mary  E.  Wilkins,  began  her  vivid  delineations 
of  New  England  life  and  character  with  stories 
of  "A  Humble  Romance,"  which  Dr.  Nicoll 
considers  among  the  very  best  of  their  kind. 

Kipling  erected  his  household  gods  upon  a 
sightly  mountain-side,  which  is  approached  from 
the  village  by  a  pleasant  old  highway  which 
curves  through  the  gold  and  green  marquetry  of 
cornfield  and  mead.  The  last  mile  of  the  way 
lies  along  upland  slopes,  where  it  follows  for  a 
while  the  course  of  a  babbling  rivulet  through 
densely  wooded  dells,  and  then  winds,  like  a 
white  stream  with  margins  of  verdure,  beneath 
long  reaches  of  road-side  trees.  Upon  the  upper 
slopes,  and  commanding  magnificent  views  of  the 
valley  with  its  noble  river  and  enfolding  moun 
tains,  lies  the  old  Beechwood  estate  of  the  Bales- 
tiers,  where,  in  the  home  of  her  grandparents, 
was  passed  much  of  the  girlhood  of  the  lady 
who  became  the  wife  of  Kipling.  She  was 
sister  to  Wolcott  Balestier, — author  of  "  The 
Victorious  Defeat,"  etc.,  and  collaborator  with 
Kipling  on  the  dramatic  "  Naulahka," — and  a 
visit  with  her  famous  husband  to  these  scenes  of 
her  childhood  resulted  in  the  selection  of  the  site 
for  their  home  among  the  broad  Balestier  acres. 
207 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

Their  first  essay  in  house-keeping  here  was  in 
the  near-by  Bliss  cottage,  which  they  occupied 
during  the  erection  of  the  new  house.  The 
cottage  is  a  neat,  little,  white-clapboard,  story- 
and-a-half  fabric,  which  the  novelist  at  first 
thought  "just  large  enough  for  two,"  but  which 
soon  had  a  third  occupant  in  the  person  of  an 
infant  daughter.  Richly  foliaged  maples  are 
aligned  along  its  front,  and  the  cottage  windows 
look  out  over  a  scene  which  might  well  inspirit 
an  author  for  his  tasks  :  across  a  foreground  of 
undulating  field,  meadow,  and  copse  we  see  the 
green  terraces  of  the  village,  the  chimneys  and 
spires  rising  through  the  tree-tops,  long  miles  of 
the  circling  Connecticut,  with  forest-clad  ridges 
attending  it  upon  either  side  and  with  a  dim 
triangle  of  distant  Massachusetts  mountains  soar 
ing  above  and  between  them.  Kipling's  unique 
individuality,  his  direct  and  masterful  style,  and 
the  glow  and  brilliance  of  genius  displayed  in 
such  tales  as  "  The  Light  that  Failed"  (which 
first  appeared  in  Lippincot?  s  Magazine),  ((  The 
Naulahka,"  and  the  wonderful  short  stories  and 
poems,  had  made  him  a  most  prominent  figure 
in  contemporary  literature  before  he  came  to 
this  hill-side  cottage,  and  here  he  accomplished 
work  which  further  enhanced  his  fame  :  in  the 
same  contracted  apartment  where  Steele  Mackaye 
208 


Kipling's  House — Naulahka 

had  written  "  Rose  Michel"  years  before,  Kip- 
pling  completed  "  Many  Inventions,"  wrote 
some  of  the  poems  of  "  The  Seven  Seas,"  and 
began  the  "Jungle  Book"  stories  which,  in  the 
opinion  of  many,  promise  most  for  the  per 
manency  of  his  high  place  in  the  literature  of 
the  world. 

A  furlong  or  two  beyond  Beechwood  House, 
Kipling's  newer  residence  is  placed  upon  an  ac 
clivity  which  rises  sharply  towards  the  western 
horizon.  The  house  stands  between  two  tall 
trees  well  back  from  the  highway,  and  is  reached 
by  a  drive  which  curves,  between  bordering 
shrubs,  from  a  rather  imposing  road-side  gate  to 
an  entrance  porch  at  the  back.  A  mossy  foun 
dation  wall,  whose  lower  side  is  pierced  by 
narrow  windows  like  the  loop-holes  of  a  feudal 
fortress,  supports  a  long,  low,  two-storied  frame 
bungalow  of  but  a  single  room  in  depth,  whose 
dun  hues  blend  and  harmonize  with  those  of  the 
hill-side.  The  second  story  is  enclosed  with 
shingles,  the  long  line  of  the  front,  facing  the 
highway,  is  broken  by  a  loggia  with  a  projecting 
balustrade  and  by  a  bay-window  which  mounts 
to  the  eaves,  the  entrance  is  protected  by  a  car 
riage  porch,  the  steep  roofs  bear  quaint  dormers, 
and  a  wide  veranda  extends  from  the  south  end 
of  the  structure.  Abutting  upon  this  veranda  is 
14  209 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

a  garden  which  is  fenced  by  a  wall  of  rough 
stones  quarried  from  the  soil  and  is  still  abloom 
with  the  bright  flowers  Kipling  tended. 

Within,  the  ample  rooms  are  handsomely 
finished  and  retain  their  light  and  tasteful  furni 
ture,  awaiting  the  return  of  the  master  ;  their 
windows  command  an  enchanting  prospect,  ex 
tending  along  lovely  pastoral  slopes  and  across 
the  deep  valley,  where  the  Connecticut  flows 
beneath  concealing  foliage,  to  the  heights  which 
rise  beyond, — at  the  right,  the  wooded  sides  and 
summit  of  Wantastiquet ;  in  front,  the  green 
hills  of  Chesterfield  (where  Howells's  wife  was 
born)  and  the  peak  of  far  Monadnoc  looming 
above  them. 

Kipling  found  this  "  an  excellent  place  to 
work."  His  study — whence  some  of  his  books 
have  been  removed  to  England — is  a  pleasant 
apartment  at  the  south  end  of  the  mansion,  with 
that  animating  landscape  in  view  from  its  win 
dows,  and  here,  denying  himself  to  all  comers, 
he  worked  carefully  and  methodically  for  some 
hours  of  each  morning  recording  his  inventions 
and  fancies  in  a  characteristically  clear  and 
diminutive  chirography, — revising  extensively 
and  destroying  so  much  that  a  friend  says  "  his 
waste-basket  sometimes  contains  more  manu 
script  than  his  desk  after  a  morning's  labor." 
210 


Kipling's  Workshop — Recreations 

Here  he  produced  much  of  the  virile  and  im 
passioned  master-verse  of  "  The  Seven  Seas," 
that  marked  him  as  a  major  poet,  many  of  the 
incomparable  stories  of  the  "Jungle  Books," 
and  the  whole  of  that  delightfully  vivid  and 
vigorous  tale  of  the  Gloucester  fisher-folk, 
"  Captains  Courageous."  Although  he  had  not 
yet  reached  the  "  dollar-a-word"  period  of  his 
authorship,  his  neighbors  considered  that  "  his 
was  the  most  profitable  industry  in  the  town." 

The  later  hours  of  the  day  were  devoted  to 
exercise — including  a  daily  excursion  to  the 
post-office — and  to  recreations  which  show  him 
to  be  thoroughly  in  love  with  life  notwithstand 
ing  the  inexorable  fatalism  of  some  of  his  tales. 
His  aversion  to  horses  disinclining  him  for 
driving,  he  at  first  walked  much  over  the  sur 
rounding  hills  and  through  all  the  near  country 
side  ;  later  he  preferred  bicycling,  and  was  often 
met  in  the  rural  roads  and  lanes  mounted  upon 
his  wheel  and  not  infrequently  accompanied  by 
his  wife.  In  these  afternoon  excursions  his 
short,  sturdy,  broad-shouldered  figure  was  usu 
ally  clad  in  a  plain  suit  of  gray,  his  round, 
swarth  face  was  shaded  by  a  broad-brimmed 
soft  hat,  his  gray-blue  eyes  always  looked 
through  glasses  worn  to  correct  astigmatism : 
he  rode  rapidly  arid  well,  and  had  a  ready  salu- 

211 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

tation  for  every  passing  acquaintance.  Occa 
sionally  he  found  recreation  in  cultivating  his 
garden  or,  in  winter,  in  shovelling  aside  the 
newly  fallen  snow,  in  going  abroad  upon  snow- 
shoes,  or  gleefully  coasting  over  the  glittering 
crust  upon  his  own  hill-side.  Some  time — not 
too  much — he  gave  to  social  functions,  in  which 
he  showed  himself  to  be  an  unassuming  and 
courteous  guest  and  the  most  devoted  and 
hospitable  of  hosts.  Among  other  visitors,  he 
entertained  the  gifted  creator  of  "Sherlock 
Holmes"  and  "  A  Desert  Drama,"  Conan 
Doyle,  who  here  had  a  most  enjoyable  ex 
perience  of  a  New  England  Thanksgiving, 
although  it  was  snowless  and  the  anticipated 
sleigh-ride  had  to  be  foregone. 

Kipling's  local  repute  is  much  less  "  satur 
nine"  than  has  been  represented.  The  publica 
tion  of  his  early  impressions  of  the  country  and 
his  criticisms  of  the  quality  and  motives  of  its 
people — couched  in  language  more  candid 
than  complaisant — naturally  aroused  a  prejudice 
which  made  it  difficult,  at  first,  for  Brattleboro 
society  to  judge  him  fairly.  His  declining  to  be 
patronized  by  prosperous  tradespeople,  his  per 
sistence  in  permitting  no  invasion  of  his  working- 
hours,  and  his  decidedly  discouraging  demeanor 
towards  unaccredited,  inquisitive,  and  imperti- 

212 


Recollections  of  Kipling — Recessional 

nent  bores,  who  would  intrude  upon  his  privacy, 
procured  for  him  a  reputation  for  insolent  in 
civility  which  was  always  undeserved  and  which 
personal  acquaintance  with  him  speedily  dis 
pelled.  Those  who  know  him  here,  who  have 
seen  him  in  his  own  home  or  in  theirs,  testify 
that  he  is  uniformly  kind  and  gentlemanly,  a 
genial  companion,  a  pleasing  talker,  and  a  sedu 
lous  observer  of  all  the  social  conventionalties. 
His  humbler  rural  neighbors  and  those  who 
have  been  in  his  employ  accord  him  a  hearty 
liking  for  his  considerate  regard  of  their  rights, 
which  is  alike  creditable  to  themselves  and  to 
him.  The  sobriquet  by  which  they  sometimes 
mention  him  is  merely  a  sportive  play  upon  his 
name,  and,  we  were  assured,  is  not  intentionally 
disrespectful.  To  gratify  him  they  aided  in  the 
establishment  of  a  near-by  post-office,  which 
they  neither  needed  nor  desired,  and  which  was 
quickly  discontinued  when  he  went  abroad. 

He  seldom  or  never  worshipped  within  a 
pew,  yet  he  gave  to  religious  teaching  its  proper 
respect  and  support,  and  those  who  here  know 
him  best  were  not  surprised  by  the  publication 
of  the  stately  yet  poetically  passionate  hymn 
of  the  "  Recessional," — the  best  and  strongest 
utterance  of  all  that  the  Victorian  Jubilee 
evoked :  these  friends  see  in  the  devout  spirit 
213 


Kipling,  Hartford  Authors,  etc. 

of  its  admonition  the  evidence  and  expression 
of  a  deep  religious  sense  which  they  had  before 
believed  was  inherent  in  his  nature. 

Kipling's  affectionate  regard  for  his  home 
upon  this  sunny  mountain-side  is  expressed  in 
the  name  he  bestowed  upon  it,  "  The  Nau- 
lahka,"  meaning  the  very  dear  or  precious, — 
literally,  "  costing  nine  Idkbs"  It  is  the  first 
and  only  habitation  which  he  ever  erected  for 
himself;  here  he  dwelt  for  some  years  and 
wrought  much  of  his  marvellous  work,  here  one 
of  his  children  was  born,  and,  whether  he  is  to 
return  to  abide  beneath  this  roof-tree,  as  has 
been  hoped,  or  whether  his  presence  here  is  to 
remain  but  a  memory,  the  spot  must  ever  be  re 
garded  with  tender  interest  by  reason  of  its 
associations  with  a  transcendent  genius  and  a 
wondrous  literary  artist. 

Among  steep  hills  a  little  farther  north  we 
come  to  the  delightful  and  well-preserved  home 
stead  in  which  Eugene  Field — the  exquisite 
poet  of  childhood — once  lived'  as  a  lad  by  the 
village  green,  the  tree  his  young  hands  planted, 
the  old  church  where  for  ninepence  a  week  he 
reported  the  sermons  for  his  grandmother,  the 
hill-top  cemetery  where  she — "  the  woman  who 
most  influenced  him" — now  sleeps  in  death ; 
214 


Eugene  Field — Hawthorne 

across  the  eastern  divide  we  find  the  sometime 
summer  haunts  of  Whittier,  Lucy  Larcom,  and 
their  intimates,  the  upland  valleys  to  which 
Hawthorne  came  with  his  life-long  friend,  ex- 
President  Franklin  Pierce,  in  his  last  futile 
quest  for  the  health  which  was  never  more 
to  be  his  in  this  world,  the  hostelry  in  which 
the  great  romancer  peacefully  breathed  out  his 
life;  but  these  shrines  must  await  another  pil 
grimage. 


215 


INDEX 


Aldrich,  Thomas  B.,  51,  53,  77,  83,  134. 

Allen,  James  Lane,  94. 

Alsop,  Richard,  mentioned,  194. 

American  Authors'  Guild,  22. 

"Annabel  Lee,"  109,  112. 

Anthony  Hope,  mentioned,  85. 

Arnold,  Edwin,  mentioned,  79. 

Arnold,  George,  51,  80. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  73,  82. 

Audubon,  John  J.,  91. 

Authors  Club,  73,  82,  83,  85. 

Bagby,  Albert  M.,  82. 

Balestier,  Wolcott,  207. 

Baltimore,  Poe  in,  123-127. 

Bancroft,  George,  73,  80,  99,  185,  203,  205. 

Bangs,  John  Kendrick,  82. 

Barlow,  Joel,  mentioned,  194. 

Barr,  Amelia  E.,  93,  95. 

Barrie,  J.  M.,  mentioned,  205. 

Battery,  The,  New  York  City,  15-17. 

Beecher,  Henry  Ward,  129,  132,  204. 

Beecher,  Lyman,  151. 

Bellamy,  Edward,  Birthplace  and  Home,  203. 

Boker,  George  H.,  mentioned,  97. 

Bonsai,  Stephen,  59,  94. 

Botta,  Mrs.  (Anne  Lynch),  60,  62,  63,  84. 

Brainard,  John  G.  C.,  mentioned,  194. 

Bread  and  Cheese  Club,  49. 

Bridges,  Robert  (Droch),  74,  82. 

Briggs,  Charles  F.,  26,  41. 

217 


Index 

Bristed,  Charles  A.,  50,  67,  100. 

Brooklyn,  Authors  in,  129,  131. 

Brooks,  Noah,  85,  92,  93. 

Brown,  Charles  Brockden,  26,  27,  37. 

Bryant,    William     Cullen,     24,     25,     27,    33,     34,    36, 

42,  49,   63,   66,   73,  77,   84,   91,   97,   134,   206 ; 

Homes  of,   53,  54,  65,   136;   Grave,   1425   Roslyn, 

136. 

Bunner,  H.  C.,  50,  54,  58,  74,  83. 
Burr,  Aaron,  25,  53,  91. 
Burton,  Richard,  200. 
Burton,  William  E.,  mentioned,  41,  53. 
Butler,  William  Allen,  20,  65,  76,  93. 
Cable,  George  W.,  29;    Homes  of,  205. 
Campbell,  Thomas,  29. 
Carleton,  Will,  130. 
Carnegie,  Andrew,  85. 
Cary,  Alice,  76,  77,  132,  205. 
Gary,  Phoebe,  76,  77,  132. 
Cedarmere,  Bryant's,  136-141. 
Century  Club,  62,  73,  84. 
Chateaubriand,  de  F.  A.,  mentioned,  54. 
Chatham  Square,  New  York,  47. 
Clark,  Lewis  Gaylord,  28,  31,  80,  182. 
Clarke,  McDonald,  14,  20,  21,  35,  45,  69,  132. 
Clemens,  Samuel  L.    (Mark  Twain),  mentioned,  83,  85, 

135;   Home  of,  196. 
Cobbett,  William,  29,  30,  44. 
Cobden,  Richard,  mentioned,  141. 
Cockloft  Hall,  1 8,  19,  36. 
Coleman,  William,  52,  53. 
Collins,  Wilkie,  mentioned,  72,  73. 
Cooke,  Rose  Terry,  194. 

218 


Index 

Cooper,  James  Fenimore,  14,  17,  44,  49,  52  ;  at  Angevine, 
157  j  at  Astoria,  134,  154;  at  Cooperstown,  161  5  at 
Heathcote  Hill,  156;  at  New  Rochelle,  1565  at 
Otsego,  161  ;  Characters  of  Tales,  159,  160,  162, 
165,  168,  169,  171  ;  Homes  in  New  York,  42,  52, 
53,  55,  675  Resorts  in  New  York,  24,  27,  495 
Scenes  of  Tales,  156,  159,  160,  162,  165,  167- 

173- 

Cooper,  Susan  Fenimore,  156,  1 66. 
Cooperstown,  161. 

Cozzens,  Frederick  S.,  -37,  40,  51,  181,  185. 
Crane,  Stephen,  92. 
Crawford,  Marion,  mentioned,  79. 
Croly,  Mrs.,  "Jenny  June,"  81. 
Curtis,  George  William,  17,  40,  42,  93. 
Dana,  Charles  A.,  40,  136. 
Dana,  Richard  H.,  24,  141. 
Daponte,  Lorenzo,  50. 
Davis,  Richard  Harding,  41,  60,  94. 
De  Kay,  Charles,  59,  73,  82,  85. 
Dennie,  Joseph,  27,  37. 
Dewey,  Orville,  62,  66,  142. 
Dickens,  Charles,  27,  194. 
Diedrich  Knickerbocker,   14,  16,  17,  23,  68,  179,  183, 

187,  190. 

Dodge,  Abigail,  194. 
Dodge,  Mary  Mapes,  mentioned,  85. 
Doesticks,  133. 

Downing,  Major  Jack,  49,  182. 
Doyle,  A.  Conan,  85,  212. 
Drake,  Joseph  Rodman,  16,  19,  20,  22,  28,  52,  68,  99; 

Homes,  39,  47  ;   Tomb,  100. 
Du  Chaillu,  Paul  B.,  40,  63,  72,  84. 
219 


Index 

Duncan  Lodge,  Poe  at,  122. 

Dunlap,  William,  24,  27,  39,  44. 

Duyckinck,  E.  A.,  62,  185,  191. 

Dwight,  Timothy,  mentioned,  194. 

Dyde's,  38. 

Easthampton,  148  ;    Payne  at,  149. 

Edwards,  Jonathan,  14,  204. 

Eggleston,  Edward,  81,  85,  87,  88. 

Farjeon,  B.  L.,  mentioned,  45. 

Fawcett,  Edgar,  21,  82,  87. 

Fay,  Theo.  S.,  mentioned,  45. 

Field,  Eugene,  82,  214. 

Fields,  James  T.,  mentioned,  72,  77. 

Fire  Island,  145,  152. 

Fiske,  Stephen,  94. 

Ford,  Paul  Leicester,  130. 

Fordham,  Poe  at,  104. 

Forrest,  Edwin,  59,  80. 

Francis,  John  W.,  14,  31,  37,  44,  49,  50,  51,  132. 

Frothingham,  O.  B.,  mentioned,  132. 

Froude,  James  A.,  mentioned,  72,  73. 

Fuller,  Margaret,  60,  97,  108;    Perished  on  Fire  Island, 

152. 

Gail  Hamilton,  194. 
Gilder,   Richard   Watson,  20,    57,    58,   62,   73,   84,   85, 

134- 

Gillette,  William  E.,  mentioned,  200. 
Godwin,  Harold,  29,  141. 
Godwin,  Parke,  42,  66,  91,  95,  140. 
Goodrich,  Samuel,  mentioned,  194. 
Gosse,  Edmund,  mentioned,  82. 
Grant,  General  U.  S.,  96,  97. 

Gratz,  Rebecca  (Rebecca  of  "  Ivanhoe  "),  49,  50. 
2  2O 


Index 

Greeley,  Horace,  26,  37,  40,  67,  76,  97,  132. 

Greenport,  147. 

Greenwich  Village,  55,  56,  57. 

Greenwood,  Literary  Graves  of,  131. 

Griswold,  Rufus  W.,  43,  78,  8 1,  91,  115. 

Habberton,  John,  155. 

Hall,  Basil,  mentioned,  91. 

Halleck,  Fitz-Greene,  16,  20,  22,  24,  25,  27,  28,  32,  39, 

41,  42,  45>  47,  49,  5°,  51,  52»  67,  68,  90,  92,  99, 

100,  103,  132,  141. 
Halpine,  Charles  G.,  mentioned,  51. 
Hamilton,  Alexander,  14,  24,  90. 
Harrison,  Mrs.  Burton,  77,  94. 
Harry  Franco,  26,  41. 
Harte,  Bret,  55,  72. 
Hartford,  Literary  Shrines  of,  193. 
Hartford  Wits,  194. 
Havens,  Alice  B.,  157. 
Hawkins,  Anthony  Hope,  mentioned,  85. 
Hawthorne,  Julian,  83,  148,  155. 
Hawthorne,     Nathaniel,     mentioned,     147,    148  j     Died, 

215. 

Hay,  John,  72,  95. 
Hepworth,  George  H.,  mentioned,  81. 
Herbert,  Henry  William,  20,  41. 
Hillhouse,  James  A.,  mentioned,  27. 
Holland,  Josiah  G.,  95,  203,  204. 
Holmes,  Oliver  W.,  mentioned,  79,  1 8 1. 
''Home,  Sweet    Home,"    Author    of,    19,   38,  44,    1485 

Additional  Stanzas,  150;   Scene  of,  148-150. 
Hone,  Philip,  32,  36. 
Hooker,  Isabella  Beecher,  197. 
Hopkins,  Lemuel,  mentioned,  194. 
221 


Index 

Houghton,  Lord,  mentioned,  72,  73,  141. 

Howells,  William  Dean,  51,  70,  74,  84,  86,  87;  Scenes 
of  Writings,  16,  40,  46,  47,  51,  56,  58,  64,  69,  70, 
86,  87. 

Huntington,  Whitman  at,  143,  145. 

Hunt's  Point,  Drake  and  Halleck  at,  101-103. 

Hutton,  Laurence,  52,  75,  855  Late  City  Residence  of, 
82,  83. 

Huxley,  Thomas,  mentioned,  73. 

Ik  Marvel,  mentioned,  181,  193. 

Irving,  John  T.,  52,  78. 

Irving,  Pierre  M.,  24,  26,  178,  180. 

Irving,  Washington,  Birthplace,  335  Homes,  19,  21,  33, 
36,  78,  174;  Hell  Gate,  99,  134;  In  New  York, 
16,  19,  20,  22,  23,  27,  28,  30,  31,  32,  45,  49,  50, 
52,  67,  98,  99;  Scenes  of  Writings,  15,  16,  17,  21, 
25>  46»  98>  175.  l83>  185-188,  190  j  Sunnyside, 
174;  Tomb,  191. 

Irving,  William,  18,  23,  42. 

James,  Henry,  57,  58,  64. 

Jameson,  Anna,  mentioned,  66. 

Jay's  Bedford  House,  160. 

Jeffrey,  mentioned,  30,  44. 

Kemble,  Fanny,  38. 

Kemble,  Gouverneur,  18. 

Kennedy,  John  P.,  mentioned,  125,  182. 

Kingsley,  Charles,  mentioned,  72,  73. 

Kipling,  Rudyard,  American  Homes  of,  208,  209;  Nau- 
lahka  of,  209;  Recollections  of,  212. 

Kirkland,  Caroline  M.,  140. 

Lamb,  Charles,  mentioned,  150. 

Larcom,  Lucy,  mentioned,  215. 

Lathrop,  George  Parsons,  59. 
222 


Index 

Lathrop,  Rose  Hawthorne,  48,  60. 

Legget,  William,  155. 

Lewis,  Sarah  Anna  (Stella),  108,  131, 

Longfellow,  H.  W.,  mentioned,  147. 

Longworth,  David,  37. 

Long  Island,  A  Literary  Ramble  in,  129-153. 

Lotos  Club,  72,  79,  84. 

Lover,  Samuel,  44. 

Lowell,  James  R.,  mentioned,  82,  100,  115. 

Ludlow,  Fitzhugh,  51. 

Lynch,  Anne  (Mrs.  Botta),  60,  62,  63,  84. 

Mackaye,  Steele,  208. 

Madison  Square,  92. 

Mahan,  Captain,  A.  T.,  89. 

Manhattan,  Literary  Haunts  of,  13-103. 

Mark  Twain,  83,  85,  135;   Home,  196. 

Martineau,  Harriet,  mentioned,  204. 

Matthews,   Brander,   46,   58,    64,    65,    74,    75,  76,    85, 

89,  90. 

McCarthy,  Justin,  mentioned,  77. 
McLellan,  Isaac,  147. 
Melville,  Herman,  76,  93. 
Miller,  Joaquin,  mentioned,  72. 
Mitchell,  Donald  G  ,  181,  193. 
Mitchell,  John  A.,  60,  72. 
Moore,  Clement  C.,  81. 

Moore,  Thomas,  44,  99,  117;   Sweetheart  of,  63,  133. 
Morris,  George  P.,  16,  26,  33,  41,  45,  90. 
Motley,  J.  L.,  mentioned,  97. 
New  Rochelle,  155. 

New  York,  Literary  Haunts  of,  13-103. 
O'Brien,  Fitzjames,  51,  66,  133. 
Osgood,  Frances  Sargent,  61,  64. 
223 


Index 

Osoli,  Margaret  Fuller,  60,  97,  108,  152. 

Paine,  Thomas,  54,  555   Farm  and  Monument,  155. 

Palmer,  Ray,  34. 

Park  Theatre,  38. 

Parton,  James,  mentioned,  77,  132. 

Patti,  Adelina,  69,  91. 

Paulding,  James  K.,  16,  18,  19,  23,  24,  31,  42,  99,  132. 

Payne,  John  Howard,  19,  38,  445   at  Easthampton,  1485 

Payne  and  "Home,  Sweet  Home,"  148—151. 
Peconic  Bay,  Whitman  at,  146. 
Percival,  James  G.,  mentioned,  24,  49. 
Pfaff 's  Beer-cellar,  50. 
Pfeiffer,  Ida,  mentioned,  141. 
Philadelphia,  Poe  in,  113. 
Poe,   Edgar   Allan,  in    Baltimore,    123;    Fordham,    1045 

Philadelphia,    1135    Richmond,    1155    Sepulchre  of, 

1275    Poe  and  "Stella,"  131. 
Poe's  "Helen,"  Home  and  Grave  of,  120,  121. 
Poe  Park,  113. 

Prescott,  W.  H.,  mentioned,  181. 
Read,  Buchanan,  43. 
Reid,  Mayne,  mentioned,  115. 

Renwick,  Jane,  Burns's  "Blue-eyed  Lassie,"  30,  176. 
Richmond,  Poe  in,  115. 
Riedesel,  Madame,  89. 
Ripley,  George,  77,  1 8 1,  206. 
Roe,  E.  P.,  72. 
Roslyn,  Bryant  at,  136. 
Sag  Harbor,  Julian  Hawthorne,  148. 
Sala,  George  A.,  mentioned,  79 
Saltus,  Edgar,  76. 
Sands,  Robert  C.,  31,  49. 

Saxe,  John  G.,  72,  129,  132,  1355   Grave,  132. 
224 


Index 

Schurz,  Carl,  96.     . 

Scott's  "Rebecca,"  49,  50. 

Sedgwick,  Catherine,  mentioned,  66,  141. 

Shew,  Maria  Louise,  52. 

Sigourney,  Lydia  Huntley,  194;   Residence,  196. 

Sleepy  Hollow,  186,  187  j  Church,  1895  Cemetery,  1905 

Legend,  183,  186,  187. 
Slosson,  Annie  T.,  195. 
Smith,  Elizabeth  Oakes,  60. 
Smith,  J.  Hopkinson,  21,  22,  64,  95. 
Southey,  Robert,  mentioned,  44. 
Stedman,   Edmund  C.,  16,  24,  51,  69,   70,  79,   84,    85, 

88,  93,  94,  194- 

Stella  Lewis,  108,  131;   Grave,  131. 
Stephens,  Ann  S.,  108,  133. 
Stoddard,  Elizabeth  B.,  70,  71,  72. 
Stoddard,  Richard  Henry,  25,  43,  48  ;  Abodes  of,  66,  69, 

70,  71,  72,  129. 
Stone,  William  L.,  36,  168. 
Stowe,  Calvin  Ellis,  194. 

Stowe,  Harriet  Beecher,  194;   Homes  of,  200,  202. 
Stuyvesant,  Peter,  16,  67,  68. 
Sunnyside,  Irving' s  Residence,  174. 
Talleyrand,  Prince,  14,  54,  91,  162. 
Tarrytown,  184. 
Taylor,   Bayard,  16,  48,  51,  60,   62,  66,  70,  77,  79,  94, 

97,  131,   132,  152;   Residences  in  New  York,   42, 

43,  59,  ?o,  75,  I29- 
Temple,  Charlotte,  23,  28,  46,  67. 
Thackeray,  William  M.,  73,  181. 
Thompson,  Mortimer,  mentioned,  133. 
Thorburn,  Grant,  29. 
Thoreau,  Henry  D.,  mentioned,  152. 

15  225 


Index 

Trumbull,  John,  mentioned,  194. 

Tuckerman,  Henry  T.,  63,  64,  181,  185. 

Tupper,  Martin  F.,  mentioned,  72. 

Van  Bibber,  mentioned,  181. 

Verplanck,  Gulian  C.,  16,  24,  49,  50,  53,  73,  185. 

Volney,  C.  F.  C.,  mentioned,  54. 

Voltaire,  F.  M.  A.,  mentioned,  92. 

Wallace,  William  Ross,  mentioned,  132. 

Wall  Street,  New  York,  Literary  Associations,  23. 

Ward,  Artemas,  mentioned,  51. 

Warner,    Charles    Dudley,    79,    83,   845    Residences    of, 

197-199. 

Washington  Square,  New  York,  57. 
Webster,  Noah,  29,  194. 
Weiss,  Susan  Archer,  119,  123. 
Westchester,  Cooper  in,  156. 
West  Hills,  Whitman  at,  143. 
Whipple,  E.  P.,  mentioned,  77. 
White,  Richard  Grant,  69,  74. 
Whitefield,  George,  mentioned,  14,  31. 
Whitestone,  Whitman  at,  135. 
Whitman,  Walt,  Birthplace  of,  143;   in  Brooklyn,  130; 

Huntington,  143,  1455   New  York,  45,  51,  68,  69; 

Peconic   Bay,    1465    Whitestone,    1355   West   Hills, 

143  ;   Scenes  of  Writings,  44,  143-147. 
Whittier,  John  G.,  mentioned,  77,  82,  215  ;   at  Hartford, 

194. 

Wiggin,  Kate  Douglas,  64,  86. 
Wilcox,  Ella  Wheeler,  84,  85,  86. 
Wilkins,  Mary  E.,  207. 
Willis,  N.   P.,  1-6,  33,  34,  36,  45,  49,  58,  59,  80,  108, 

115,  147,  181,  185. 

Wilson,  General  J.  G.,  22,  39,  96,  97,  140,  150. 
226 


Index 

Wilson,  Robert  Burns,  16. 

Windust's  Refectory,  37. 

Winter,  William,  mentioned,  17,  51. 

Winthrop,  Theodore,  59. 

Woodberry,  George  E.,  61,  74. 

Woods,  Matthew,  88,  115. 

Woodworth,  Samuel,  25,  26,  27,  44,  50. 

Yates,  Edmund,  mentioned,  72. 


THE   END. 


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